Could dance, won't dance

OK, I thought it was only Oxford crowds who don't dance at gigs but I am beginning to suspect that I am simply not abreast of current trends. As far as I can ascertain one no longer shows one's appreciation at a music concert by dancing but by standing still and taking pictures with your mobile phone. Clapping and cheering between songs appears to be acceptable behaviour but dancing is, like, so last century.

I came to this conclusion after witnessing an exuberant performance by Jamie Lidell at Koko London on Camden High Street last Tuesday night. Lidell is a singer whose music is an interesting fusion of soul and electronica; imagine Otis Redding mucking around with a sampler and a bunch of digital effects processors. Jamie's live performances are equally innovative: He starts the show singing to the accompaniment of a traditional backing band but then he will saunter over to a computer and rack of digital toys and starts to record himself humming, beat-boxing, singing a bass line, wailing, and building up layer upon layer of vocal improvisations while his band go off for a cup of tea. As he creates a new track made of vocal loops right there on stage, the band eventually drift back on stage and start to play along and somehow segue back into a familiar song. It is, quite frankly, fucking brilliant.

It is not a mere showcase of electronic trickery, though: Jamie and his gang play a damn fine set of good old fashioned-style soul music. Jamie is a performer of great energy and humour, his voice powerful, intense, tender and heartfelt. Even though he is obviously the focus of attention he is also generous to his players and gives them all their due credit. I can't remember the last time I saw a band having so much fun playing together on stage, their obvious enjoyment truly infectious.

Infectious, at least, for me and a few others.

Fair enough, the set consisted mainly of material from Jamie's new album Jim which was only released the day before. My copy turned up in the post on the morning of the gig so I was fortunate enough to give it three or four listens before heading out to the gig. That's not the point: I would have enjoyed the show regardless of whether I was at all familiar with the new songs or not. Throw some great music at me and if I engage with it then I will damn well enjoy myself. True, I dance like your dad but when I hear something I love I want to move about a bit.

My complaining about people not dancing at gigs is actually quite absurd. I'm horribly self-conscious on the dance floor and despite my eclectic tastes in music I am really fussy: if I don't like the choons then I ain't dancin'. I am also lacking the "cheese gene", the appreciation, genuine or ironic, of cheesy, juvenile pop music - you know, the standard wedding DJ repertoire. I have to hear something I really love before I can forget myself and strut my funky uncoordinated thang.

Am I a music snob? Maybe. Probably. On the other hand, I don't listen to anything because it is supposed to be cool, I listen to it because I like it - that's the bottom line: do I like it? I couldn't help but feel that many people were at that Jamie Lidell gig because he is très chaud right now - there were an awful lot of painfully trendy designer spectacles in the crowd - rather than people who simply dig his music and wanted to have a good time. Either that or they were there just to get some "cool" photos to upload to their fucking Flickr profiles.

Having said all that, I didn't dance at the concert I went to at the Barbican the following evening: Pierre Boulez conducting the London Symphony Orchestra performing works by Schoenberg, Stravinsky and Bartók. A wise decision on my part, I think. I somehow doubt the audience nor the performers would have appreciated my standing up and throwing shapes in the church of dance as they played Sonata For Two Pianos and Percussion.