The Good, The Bad & The Queen Impress With Names Alone

When I heard that the opening act for The Good, The Bad And The Queen's first North American show was going to be a magician, I got really psyched. What could be better suited for a caravan of iconic musicians than rabbits in hats, explosions of smoke and women being cut in half?

To mine and the entire crowd's disappointment, Mysterion The Mind Reader, who claimed to have a PhD in ESP, opened the show instead. After a handful of failed attempts to read people's minds on stage, the crowd quickly grew impatient and weren't afraid to let the magic man know. In what sounded like an angry mob in the background of some cheesy movie, people hollered, "Get off the stage!" "You suck!" and "You're a hack!" In his defence, you have to have balls to pull off a mind-reading show at a packed Kool Haus.

The Good, The Bad And The Queen (they actually don't have a name, but for the sake of clarity we'll just do what everyone else does and call them that) were going to have to pull out all the stops to bring the crowd's excitement back, and they did so with little effort.

At exactly 10 p.m., an all-female, four-piece string section sat down in the corner of the stage, which was decorated with a painted backdrop of old London and hanging lines of prayer flags. As the quartet played an intense opening serenade, Simon Tong, Tony Allen, Paul Simonon and finally Damon Albarn made their way onto the stage, dressed as they are in most TGTBTG promo shots. Once Albarn donned a big top hat, the band opened with "History Song."

The crowd's reaction to seeing the four men walk on stage was incredible. They ooze cool. People went absolutely wild for Albarn and even wilder for Simonon.

It was obvious early on that with their only album having been released just a couple of months ago, people were there more to see these musicians than hear the music. On that note, they played the record in its entirety.

The band and string section sounded great, and with a fifth member adding the necessary mic effects and electronic sounds, the songs were pretty much exactly replicated from the album. Albarn's vocals were spot-on and Simonon didn't disappoint either, playing his bass with a smoke on the end of it and an exaggerated swagger. Allen's drumming was dub-tastic and he had a grin on his face the whole show, while Tong's guitar work was also tight, although he had less of a presence then the rest of the band.

There were three bizarre things about this seamless, laid back show. First, the main set lasted just 50 minutes. There were no covers and no extended jams (even the album's seven-minute title track felt short).

Second, despite the down-tempo vibe of the album and the chilled atmosphere on stage, the crowd was dancing. I'm not talking about swaying and head bobbing, I saw full-on jumping, shuffles and arms in the air.

Third, when the group came back for an encore, they played a track that Albarn explained was a "song that didn't quite make it onto the album." It was a semi-energetic instrumental number, during which Albarn ran to all areas of the stage directing people. He aggressively orchestrated his bandmates, except for Simonon, who he just jumped around instead. It was a tense last few minutes, but the crowd still ate it up.

Without straying from the album and with little banter between songs (Albarn mostly said thanks and only told a short story about how his hat didn't fit properly), the group played a solid yet lacklustre show. Simonon laid into the mic when leaving the stage and said, "Thanks a lot, eh," to which the audience lost it all over again. That was the kind of magic that didn't make this show a flop. In the presence of giants, the show would have succeeded no matter what.