When I last saw Bleachers perform their indie rock in London two years ago, Jack Antonoff chucked giant inflatable tomatoes into the audience. On 20 March, at the second of two sold-out shows at the O2 Forum in Kentish Town, north-west London, the craziest it gets is a rendition of “Happy Birthday” for Matt, the band’s “front-of-house” guy. Antonoff hands a birthday cake down into the crowd, who unevenly pass it backwards towards the bar. He almost follows, wobbling at the edge of the barrier between the stage and the stalls, but stops short of attempting a full-on crowd surf. The previous night, he fell over moving closer to the huddle of fans squeezed up to the stage.
The night I see the band, he describes Kent as the “New Jersey of England” (a questionable comparison). Antonoff’s performance comes fresh off the back of his third consecutive Grammy for Producer of the Year. And it is for his production work that Antonoff is better known, most recently on Taylor Swift’s Midnights and Lana del Rey’s Did You Know That There’s a Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd.
Bleachers, who were formed in 2013, is Antonoff’s passion project; a side hustle to his more eminent work as a producer. The band released their fourth, self-titled album earlier this month. The record posits a different, more authentic side to Bleachers’ sound, a real change from the Springsteen-inspired belters of their back catalogue. New songs such as “Me Before You” or “Tiny Moves” are more thoughtful and poised than earlier crowd pleasers like “I Wanna Get Better” or “Rollercoaster”. The band’s new tracks incorporate gentle synth melodies and earnest lyrics in direct contrast with the louder, rock-inspired singalongs of their earlier style. This shift mirrors transitions in Antonoff’s personal life. Last year, he married the actress Margaret Qualley in a heavily publicised New Jersey wedding and most of the songs on the new album are love letters to her. Despite this tonal shift, the energy in the room never wanes. Antonoff – who may just be the busiest man in music – shows no signs of slowing down yet.
[See also: Laufey at EartH: woozy and nostalgic love songs]
Content from our partners
Related
