Kosheen kicked off their latest UK tour on a sweltering late summer evening...
The morning after this electrifying performance by these Bristol-based purveyors of electronic showstoppers, I woke up with country siren Dolly Parton’s Jolene swirling around my fuzzled head. Yet instead of the Smoky Mountains’ songwriter’s yearning lament to ‘please don’t take my man’, it was ‘Ko-sheen, Ko-sheen, Ko-sheen, Ko-sheeeen’ that was running endlessly around my noggin - it was that kind of gig.
Kicking off their latest UK tour on a sweltering late summer evening, the trio had thankfully plumped for the city’s premier air-conditioned venue - although irrepressible frontwoman Sian Evans and Co managed to work up an impressive sweat anyway.
Christened after a North American Apache warrior (Cochise), the three-piece certainly go into battle for their fans. After reuniting in 2019, two decades after exploding onto the dance scene with their debut album, Resist, the triumvirate have lost none of their fervour or appetite for performing.
Backed by towering virtuoso guitarist Ron McElrory and powerhouse drummer Mitch Glover (having a ball on his new electronic kit), it doesn’t take long for an initially reserved crowd to turn into a giddy mass of dancing bodies.
Save Your Tears is belted out, surfing on the sort of lick The Prodigy built a career on, while Hungry’s more mellow vibes showcases the full range of Evans’ barnstorming yet utterly soulful voice.
A great and natural raconteur, she jokes about us all needing a Ralgex bath after this, yet at 51, she is as formidable as ever dressed all in black and bestriding the stage.
She tells a lovely tale about when in her day job in youth services, she hit a brick wall with one surly teenage boy, until a colleague quietly encouraged him to check her out on YouTube that night, which led to the frost melting at their next session together.
Following a frenetic instrumental jam, Evans sashays back on stage for the finale with an impressive glass of red on the go.
Raised in Caerphilly, with a history of male voice choirs in the family, Evans’ cut her teeth in the pubs of South Wales and all of that gritty experience floods out here, such is her complete control of her arena in sound and movement.
An encore of the epic Catch is part of a suitably enthralling finale, before the trio disappears with the heights of Hebden Bridge in their sights. ‘Thanks for breaking the seal!' Evans quips before departing. It was our pleasure Kosheen.
Kosheen performed at Metronome on 7 September 2023.
metronome.uk.com
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