The Gang of Four returned to New York in great style and form last night, showing no signs of their two-decade gap in performing. They were tight and sharp and ready to take over the world. Darting across stage and frequently switching places, Andy Gill’s jagged guitars sounded every bit as dangerous as they do on those old records while Jon King punctuated his singing by wildly flailing his arms like some sort of spastic messiah.
It felt a bit like a socialist church (the crazy, speaking-in-tongues, big-tent revival kind) as the crowd (a wonderful mix of old-timers and kids) screamed along with lines like “The change will do you good!” and “To Hell with poverty!!!”
The set list was mostly restricted to songs from their first two albums, the only ones that all four original members played on, although the late, Joseph Conrad-quoting “We Live As We Dream, Alone” was a welcome surprise. I understand the band will be re-recording some of their old classics for release on iTunes and perhaps some sort of modified petroleum product (they don’t own their original masters, so this would be the way to make a proper profit for their trouble). This is not unwelcome, but new material would be well worth the wait. This is one reunion that only serves to enhance the band’s legacy.
Brooklyn’s own Radio 4 is opening for the entire national tour. They’re a great band, but their sound is awfully, ah, inspired by Gang of Four, and I feared that they wouldn’t compare well side-by-side, but they acquitted themselves nicely.