Review: CSS and Florence and the Machine @ Koko

Proving that it's hard these days to put on a gimmicky night without the blessing-and-curse stamp of a large corporation, Koko tonight played host to the first Xbox My Gig night, where a competition winner gets £50K to put on their dream gig.

We won't devote too many column inches to the fantastic, much-lauded electro-popstrels CSS, on account of them having gobbled up enough already. Aside from their catsuits and such and such, they fill the stage with their good-looking Brazilian staff, lots of balloons and a great party; leadsinger Lovefoxx struts and jumps around with the meanest quiff in Camden, and if you hadn't been in the venue an hour before you might just wonder if she is the coolest woman in pop.

Instead let's talk about joyful support act Florence Mary Leontine Welch, aka Florence and the Machine. If CSS fill you with a nice warm feeling, Florence will likely chuck in a mild aneurism and something that soars inside you, like her big, big voice that swoops around Koko and cannot be ignored. How can we set apart a female artist who can actually sing from the next one? We're not short of them, but it's not enough to be able to hit the top note, because we're not in an episode of The X-Factor (lord, if only). Florence writes mean, vibrant pop songs about kisses and fists and bodily organs, and the primal spills out of her performances where she spins and dances like a child. She has classic style: a high-neck and a short hem and a fringe swept to one side; gold-drenched, expressive, shiny, tiny hands, and legs that go on for miles and miles. Against the harp in the background on one song, her voice is hard like a rasp and full of richness. She hits the drum next to her, and like everything she turns her hands to, she becomes it: she is the drums.

Go and see her and be part of it, or harder, be a sideline to it. She'll pick up the detached few in the room and politely elbow them to one side. You can bet you'll be but a well-oiled cog in her elegant operation in no time ...

Image from jbeckers' photostream under the Creative Commons Licence.