Review: Lady Bird at Omeara, London

Photo by Andrew Higgs, courtesy of Lady Bird on Instagram.

Words by: Johnny Fry

Lady Bird Live At The Omeara

Lady Bird bound onto Omeara’s auction-house looking stage with rabble-rousing-spirit, asking the crowd when their last London show was. We knew too well when that was: far too long! Strutting around with Kentish glee, the band looked ready to put on a ruckus of a show. They addressed us with waves and salutes, thanked us for coming and showed respect to their steadfast disciples.

The room looked rearing and ready to have it as soon as the mayhem began. Lady Bird’s second track, Social Potions, rallied the moshers, partitioned the faint hearted and engrossed the eager onlooker. Everyone felt as involved and provoked as the sweaty man in the red t-shirt having a fight with the front of the stage. Just as we thought the energy was going to come down, the frontman jumped into the crowd, mic in hand, riling us up into a whirlwind.

After this mayhem, Lady Bird announced the gig was going to be a taste of what’s to come from the band. A flavour of the future that welcomes new ideas developed over a Covid sabbatical from gigging. This was a humbling surprise for the audience – as Don (fittingly, the don of the band) invited us to enjoy an acoustic medley from the three of them.

Don, proudly wearing a yellow-stained-vest, familiarized himself with his old, trusty acoustic guitar, whilst the guitarist whipped out a banjo. Meanwhile, the drummer accelerated his punk attitude, donning boxing shorts and a spiked ginger hair do. His hair was accompanied with a raspy voice that hadn’t made it through to any of the tracks until now.

The original storm never quite seemed to brew again after the change of timbre to slow, acoustic anti-folk. We were amazed by how this anarchic trio could lull us into a deep emotional stupor with ten strings and a man in boxing shorts. Collective emotions were often intense both on the high end and low end.