Review: The Wildhearts, O2 Academy

Oh dear. Just before this tour kicked off, mercurial Ginger was hinting heavily that he’d fallen out with the rest of the Wildhearts for the 197th (estimate) time. Would this penultimate date on their 20th anniversary P.H.U.Q. tour end in rancour and chaos?

Before we find out, here’s his other band: the perky, power-poppy Hey! Hello! First impressions are that new singer Hollis Mahady is much more personable and engaging than her rather gauche predecessor Victoria Liedtke, bouncing around the stage as though it’s a giant trampoline. They’ve got plenty of good, primary-coloured, catchy, mostly upbeat songs with huge choruses, notably Don’t Stop Loving the Music, Honour (originally recorded by Ginger as a duet with Courtney Love) and set closer Swimwear. The man himself tends to take something of a backseat onstage, as if to emphasise that he’s just part of the band. Whether they’ll succeed in taking the place of the Wildhearts in punters’ affections, as he apparently hopes, remains to be seen, as their sonic palette is much narrower.

Like 3 Colours Red (remember them, pop kids?), Baby Chaos were one of a slew of rather forgettable acts that sprung up in the Wildhearts’ wake back in the early 1990s. Rather mystifyingly, 17 years on from their last album, they’ve decided to re-form. Guess what? They’re still rather forgettable. Couldn’t we have had another 45 minutes of Hey! Hello!?

These ‘classic album’ tours can be a mixed blessing. On the plus side, we know exactly what we’re going to get, and the order in which it’s likely to be played. But for this to succeed you need, to coin a cliché, an “all killer, no filler” album. Let’s face it: even the mighty Iron Maiden have occasionally included some dodgy tracks on their best albums. Nobody wants to stand there dreading the duffer that’s coming up. Perhaps remarkably for a collection of songs apparently recorded in a blizzard of cocaine, the Wildhearts‘ biggest hit, 1995’s P.H.U.Q., not only fits the bill but also seems to have been sequenced to create a great show, bookended by bounce-along crowd favourites I Wanna Go Where the People Go and Getting It. It’s also impressively diverse, big anthems (Jonesing for Jones) rubbing shoulders with punky thrash (Woah Shit, You Got Through) and anti-romantic heavy melodic pop (Just In Lust). And the mighty Caprice sees the Wildhearts at their heaviest and proggiest.

They pull the whole thing off flawlessly, leaving the ecstatic audience to perform ‘hidden song’ Don’t Worry ‘Bout Me on their own. And if that wasn’t nostalgic enough, the Wildhearts return after a short break with Nothing Ever Changes But the Shoes, which whisks us right back to their first-ever Bristol show (Bierkeller, 1991, supporting Wolfsbane, if memory serves). Now Ginger’s a heart-on-his-sleeve guy. If he’s having a bad day, everybody knows about it. But on this occasion, he seems to be thoroughly enjoying himself and there’s no reason to doubt him when he says this tour has been the most fun he’s had in years. Whether leading a jolly singalong of “Stick it up your arse, you fucking cunt”, cheekily teasing us with the first verse of Motley Crue’s Looks That Kill before My Baby is a Headfuck, keeping his microphone stand roadie busy by repeatedly knocking it over, or, ahem, forgetting the lyrics to The Revolution Will be Televised, he’s having a ball up there with compatriots CJ, Ritch Battersby and returning Bristol resident bassist ‘Random’ Jon Poole.

The extended encore comprises a typically mixed bag of old favourites (TV Tan, Caffeine Bomb) and obscurities (a cover of Jason and the Scorchers’ White Lies), concluding with the pleasingly cynical Love U Till I Don’t. As he departs, Ginger tells us that he now can’t believe this could be the last-ever Wildhearts tour. Let’s hope the contrary old bugger is right.