Their sold-out secrets are embedded within their empathy for pop music. Deco have become one of the most hotly anticipated live acts this year, and we were lucky enough to catch them at Rescue Rooms...
One of the most admirable things about Deco is the fact that they aren’t afraid to hide their empathy for chart pop music. So many hypocritical indie bands these days shun the “mainstream”, to look authentic or credible but in doing so make themselves look foolish. Not these guys though they know what they’re about and aren’t apprehensive to express it.
With support from up-and-coming local Cam Mannix, we were coaxingly warmed up with a laid-back, sans-drummer approach to his performance. Debuting an unreleased track amongst the psychedelia, he brought a subtle groove to his set that enticed the crowd closer to the stage.
Deco take to the stage wearing their pop credentials on their sleeves; opening with titular number Destination: I Don’t Know, the falsetto synths inducing us within their nostalgic modernity quicker than you can say ‘discotheque’. Without the need of that mirror ball – and believe us, they put it to good use later in the show – the room is instantly transported into a temporary Studio 54-esque night as the band enter the stage. It’s a heartfelt anthem with surprising depth reaching further than its funk-tastic production, frontman Max Kendall making apt use of the stage to connect with the audience in hip bumps, shoulder jives and arm waves alike.
Tonight’s show carries its own anecdotal sentiments beyond the music. It’s the closest the band will get to playing a ‘homegrown’ show, Nottingham being the city in which the band first met and originally formed, and the appreciation is evident on stage.
“This is full, isn’t it?!” Kendall grins, thanking the crowd in campaigning their debut album into the UK album charts last month.
“It’s mindboggling to think it’s been exactly ten years since we first performed in this very venue, from a support slot to the headliner?! Thank you!”
Keeping the celebrations in full recognition, Forever is a lovely slice of synth funk, packaged beautifully within the hues of orange reminiscent of that album cover. The band are in full swing, their own side-stepping syncopated to their sugary instrumentals; Do Ya? heavily featuring that plinky indie guitar tone that reverberates through the speakers and into the soles of our feet. We may be slightly out of tune in our singing, yet we’re irrefutably toe tappin’ and head boppin’ tonight—and it’s hard not to. When you have such a nuanced band as Deco who have harnessed these soaring melodies with dazzling, jaunty precision, it would be rude not to show your appreciation in dance.
Intimacy is the underlying current of a Deco show
Bittersweet Symphony, we say with reverence, is the highlight of the show. You forget it's a cover. For all intents and purposes, they make this familiar song their own with such showcasing simplicity. Transitioning on the back of this high-energy momentum, the band take us “back in time a little bit—we've been doing this a bloody long time!” with a medley of older material. You could say that we Just Can’t Get You (Deco) Out of My Mind and that we really Don’t Want To Go Out of this venue soon. Bluntly, we’re having a reyt ol’ good time.
Intimacy is the underlying current of a Deco show. Whether that be their consistent nods to their initial virality with an ‘80s-inspired cover of Yellow thrown into the mix, or the disparate phone lighting swaying throughout Atmosphere, it’s that tangible feeling of unity that surpasses the music. “This is definitely our favourite gig in Nottingham ever!” they say — and we couldn’t agree more.
We reach the frenzied pinnacle of the night with a tidal sweep of hit after hit in the encore. Photograph has Max joining the crowd on the floor, commandeering this ship of call-and-
response with a smile on his face: “Unreal, I might just stay here!”
Rain similarly has Lucy bouncing along with her saxophone in hand, pinballing around the pit to the echoing ‘Ba- bada-ba-bada-da!’, and we can confidently say there wasn’t a single person not jumping. Their self-proclaimed ‘good mood music’ infected us all with that good mood feeling tonight, the kind that lingers in the back of your mind for a long time after, and as the band took a final bow together, it swiftly becomes a need to see them again.
“Maybe we’ll see you at Rock City? We might have to do a few more here first...”
Deco performed at Rescue Rooms on 24th October 2024, with support from Cam Mannix.
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