London-borne indie outfit Bloc Party’s first Denver show in nearly six years played out much like its relatively uneven career—energetic, largely enjoyable but also rather front-loaded. In spite of a few second-half missteps, however, Bloc Party played a satisfying mix of cuts new and old, which were gobbled up enthusiastically by the packed house at the Ogden.
A falling out between the band members after their experiment-gone-awry third album, Intimacy, made it unclear whether the UK quartet would ever find itself on a stage again. Four years later, the situation couldn’t feel more different—hot on the heels of its solid comeback effort, Four (released last August), Bloc Party appears confident and comfortable to be playing together again. Indeed, this is a band that’s lived the cycle of hype, hiatus and healing, and now its members play with an assurance that can only come after seeing the brink and still managing to fight your way back.
And fight, there was—with a few exceptions, Bloc Party filled its set with some of the more explosive numbers from its career, including the Pumpkins-esque smash of “Kettling,” the electrifying war chant of “Ares,” and the propulsive, angular “Positive Tension.” Bloc Party’s most recent record, which played the lead role on Tuesday night’s setlist, is by far its most unabashedly hard LP to date, and the foursome appeared to have no qualms with blasting your ears out.
What this meant was, for the majority of the set, fans who came looking for an appropriate venue to dance, jump around and even throw a few elbows were in friendly territory. The literally UFC-themed “Coliseum,” for example, completely blew the roof off, and received one of the most enthusiastic ovations of the night. The build-up to the fearsome “Song For Clay (Disappear Here)” was another highlight, with perma-shirtless drummer Matt Tong pounding his kit like a man possessed.
At the same time, lighter numbers such as the bittersweet slow burn of “Day Four” or the melancholic “Signs” sounded all the more frail in comparison, sucking the momentum out of an otherwise momentous set. Perhaps the greatest misfire of the night came at the start of the second encore, in which the group debuted a brand-new song called “Montreal” that, while sonically pretty, was also monotonous—a poor late-game choice.
In fact, much of the second half of the set felt a bit like it was playing catch-up with the first. Even with highlights such as the first-album classics “This Modern Love” and “Helicopter,” or the group’s delightful mash-up of Rihanna’s “We Found Love” with the soaring dance-rock stylings of “Flux,” the boys of the Bloc never quite managed to rekindle the flames later on in the night that it had lit with its potent and aggressive first act.
This is not to say the band ever felt any less competent or tightly wound; rather, Bloc Party simply loaded the latter part of its set with songs that just don’t work as well in a live setting, making this second half slowdown far more an issue of sequencing than a lack of technical proficiency. This surprising absence of awareness, however, may just make the difference between Bloc Party being a good live band, and a truly great one.
