Be at Proud on a Saturday night is a tough gig for any band. The band are not the focus of the evening, meaning you’re dealing with an audience getting progressively drunker with little more desire than to hear four to the floor and get dancing. In this sense MAY68 are a success. Their synth pop is fairly charming for a song or two in a way so incredibly familiar and so incredibly chic right now. Sure their singer takes more than a little influence from Karen O, and you could hear these songs countless times before realising you were hearing a new artist, but all that’s relatively forgivable.

What really grated about the set was the distinct lack of variation. Sonically each member seems to occupy their role and stays true to it from start to finish. With all the songs displaying a similar tempo, and such rigorous roles, after four or five songs your good will starts to wane. These are guys are evidently more than competent, but with such a familiar sound, it’s difficult to capture the exact something which makes them stand out from their peers. It lacks the unexplainable entity that makes you think “Hey! MAY68! Cool!”. Who knows though, not being so familiar with their recorded output, maybe the signature is just less distinguished here with them realising what tonight’s audience want and getting them dancing. On instinct though, I’d be surprised if that’s the case.

A short while afterwards and now with the crowd (and from the looks of things the band) slightly leery with plenty of intoxicants in them, French Horn Rebellion kicked off their set. They’d been gathering momentum for months beforehand, but with their prestigious place opening the latest Kitsune compilation, the hype has been getting exponential. With just the two brothers on stage before an arsenal of synthesisers and other toys, the set kicks off to a series of sinister sounds reminiscent of a science fiction b-movie.

As it continues in this way, with a crowd mostly unfamiliar with their music, a slight mistake in the synth sound that sends Robert into the giggles is met with the some heckling from the back. With this in mind, it’s only moments later the beats kick in and the parties begin. With such a huge sense of the fun and the absurd in their show, you can’t help feeling this slight problem at the beginning of the show knocks them slightly, with it taking quite a number of songs before Robert’s unique dancing style becomes the focus of so many. It takes some powerful moves from David climbing onto the dancefloor before they really kick into their groove.

The fantastic elements are all there, the “murder” of David and convenient resurrection for the second half of their title track, the “REMIX!” dance explosion, the passionate French horn playing and the epic closing twofer of Up All Night and Beaches And Friends.

They’re incredible showmen with more touring experience than some bands who’ve been going for years allowing them to deal with the initial problems better than most. It takes the crowd a little time to warm to their premeditated shambolism, but by the end it’s just the soulless who aren’t dancing like idiots.

By Steven Morgan