Live Review: James Blake, Oliver Tank

9 August 2013 | 11:01 am | Scott Aitken

As he hummed the melody to Retrograde, the audience let out a huge cheer which ended up looped in with the vocals, returning again and again throughout the song.

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Punters were quick to filter into the Astor Theatre last Friday night to escape the cold and harsh winds sweeping across the city. On the bright side though, the lucky crowd were there for one of two sold-out sideshows by British electro crooner James Blake before he jetted off to Byron Bay for a headline performance at the Splendour In The Grass festival.

Sydney electronic artist Oliver Tank gave a fantastic performance that showed off the undeniable influence of Blake on his music, combined with elements of house and hip hop.

Despite a relatively short set of just four songs, Tank's Help You Breathe along with a radically altered cover of Snoop Dogg's Beautiful were highlights, with the young artist seeming pretty stoked throughout the show to be supporting one of his idols and influences.

Shortly after, James Blake arrived, greeted by a tremendous cheer from the audience. In a surprising first song choice, Blake and the other two musicians that made up his band launched into Air & Lack Thereof, with Blake's soulful voice sounding just as good as it does on the record. Each musician was flagged by powerful tungsten lights and several strobes which synchronised with the beat of the music, creating a hypnotic atmosphere onstage during throughout the performance.

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I Never Learnt To Share was the first time Blake layered different takes of himself singing, each time adding more and more subtle electronic effects to raise the energy of the music. From Life Round Here to I Am Sold and Our Love Comes Back, the set favoured songs from his latest album and showed off Blake's amazing falsetto. Limit To Your Love and Digital Lion both got amazing live re-workings, with the heavy dub sound of the bass almost threatening to shake the venue to its foundations.

Blake was his usual soft-spoken and understated self as he announced the near end of the set:This is our last one, thanks so much for supporting us, Perth. I'm loving it more and more each time I come here.” As he hummed the melody to Retrograde, the audience let out a huge cheer which ended up looped in with the vocals, returning again and again throughout the song. The Wilhelm Scream featured a far more intense live treatment before Blake drove the night home with an amazing solo rendition of Joni Mitchell's A Case Of You.