Gig review: The Maccabees - Glasgow QMU

WHERE would indie music be without studious young men hiding behind their fringes while they fondle their effects pedals? Less jam-packed with bands like The Maccabees, that’s for sure.

This London five-piece are the definition of a competent mid-league indie troupe, but they have aspirations to step up from the student union circuit, maybe even to join their blueprint band, Arcade Fire, in sweeping fields of festivalgoers along in their wake.

As their set currently stands, they have mustered a big but ultimately hollow sound built chiefly around the clear, ringing guitars of brothers Felix and Hugo White whose epic Edge-style riffs are fired into the stratosphere without so much as a melody to back them up. Despite the choirboy clarity of his tone and winning vulnerability of his delivery, vocalist Orlando Weeks clearly does not fancy himself as the melodramatic torch singer he probably could be, preferring instead to enunciate in clipped phrases. In the absence of any lyrical hooks, the crowd sang along to a sinewy bassline instead.

In a mostly brisk and occasionally rabble-rousing set, their recent single Pelican was the most brisk and rabble-rousing number of the lot, barrelling along so nimbly that it achieved take-off, before touching down again for a brief soulful breakdown. With its insidious chant and natural momentum, it stood out from the pack of material from their current album Given To The Wild, which mostly makes a bid for Coldplay’s vacuous anthemic territory.

Rating: ***