Spoiler Alert: Wolf Alice are the best band in Britain right now! Now that’s out of the way I can tell you how their electric and intimate set at Swansea’s Sin City reinforces that point. Coming off of the back of their first number one album and third Mercury nomination for their career best “Blue Weekend”, the group have never been a stronger position. Already taking top billings at festivals, this series of intimate gigs supporting grass roots venues is a rare treat and probably the smallest venue you will see them in a very long time.
The temperature in the room is rising as much as the anticipation and when they enter the stage, the roar from the crowd is deafening; a trend that follows for pretty much the duration of the evening. They come right out of the gates with “Smile” with its thundering bass from Theo Ellis looking like a man possessed in the best possible way. The energy on stage is palpable and this rubs off on every single body in the room.
This goes straight into a one-two from “Visions Of A Life” with “Beautifully Unconventional” and “Formidable Cool” the later of which gets everybody bouncing around. “Delicious Things” is a thing of absolute beauty and even in the short space of time that it’s been released, the new record is clearly one that has been embraced and absolutely loved by the fans. It’s evident on this and on the sublime “Lipstick On The Glass”, which sees Ellie Rowsell’s vocals stronger than ever and dare I say it, even better than on record. The range on display is fantastic, with extra little filler bits being put in here and there, all note perfect.
After yet another rapturous reaction from the crowd, they exclaim that this is the loudest crowd they’ve played in front of for a very long time. They aren’t wrong and you can tell that every member is buzzing and fully up for giving it their all tonight. During the mellow “Safe From Heartbreak” everyone has their arms aloft and Roswell even takes her earpiece out to listen to the couple of hundred people singing along to everything. They can’t help but laugh and smile from the reaction these new songs are getting.
The set highlight comes in probably one of the best songs they’ve ever written. “How Do I Make It Ok?”. The song builds and builds to a euphoric synergy of noise towards the end. I look down at my arms and can feel the hairs standing up on them such is the impact it has. They aren’t afraid to let the taps off though, as shown in “Play The Greatest Hits”. There’s an angsty old school grunge feel to the song that everyone in the front half of the room is throwing their body into. It shows the dexterity of a band like this that they can just flick the switch and it doesn’t feel strange or alien at all.
After the sublime “Feeling Myself” comes a series of old school songs kicking off with “Giant Peach”, which again shows how great they are when everything is just let loose. Something about the song just feels fun from its infectious groove to its heavy breakdown right at the end. “Moaning Lisa Smile” is followed by the joyous “Bros” and what’s great to see is that there’s not one single person who is not having the best time, be it on the stage or in the sweaty crowd.
They round off the set with “The Last Man On Earth”, which almost can’t be heard from the noise of the singing from everybody packed into the room. The way in which they interact and embrace the crowd, shows that they really are a band for the fans. It feels that in the blink of an eye the set has gone, but we are treated to one final song in the form of “Don’t Delete The Kisses”. Yet again every element of the song melds together in a beautiful way from the luscious guitar, to the harmonising backing vocals and newly added keys into the mix. This is the best version of Wolf Alice we have seen from a band who have constantly been raising the bar for everybody else to catch up. They leave the stage triumphantly, promising that they will come and do this again. We can only hope that they will tour the little venues like in the future, but surely the arenas are beckoning for album number four?