Live Review – The Orb: Brixton Electric, 20/05/23
Some 18 albums later, The Orb prove more powerful than ever
It starts with just one note. A colossal, hot blast of sub-bass that shakes the rafters of this 120-year-old building and threatens your eardrums, felt as much as heard. Then it repeats, with equal brutality. And repeats and repeats, until all eyes are on the empty stage, awaiting the imminent arrival of Dr Alex Paterson and his latest sonic sparring partner Michael Rendall behind the impressively substantial bank of gear awaiting them.
The pair scuttle on, no spotlights, no egos, just silhouettes as the huge screen behind flickers into life. Knobs begin to be twiddled and slowly, as the bass continues to call out like some South London reggae foghorn, the magical, tinkling keyboard line to ‘O.O.B.E.’ begins to weave itself around the chaos, taking form slowly until the penny drops with the crowd and cheers go up. It’s a typical Orb-like way of operating: open up with one of the best loved songs from your number one album, but turn it inside out and reinvent it via the decks, the mixing desk and the echo chamber.
Clearly, even now, they like their audiences to work a little to get their reward. While it would be easy for them to trot out large sections of The Orb’s Adventures Beyond the Ultraworld and UFOrb in more or less identical fashion, they’d much rather present Prism, their 18th LP, pretty much in full, peppered by the occasional glorious step back in time.
In any case, it’s Saturday night, so it’s time to get their techno out for the lads and ladies. There’s a monumental rendition of ‘The Blue Room’ early on, air raid sirens blaring and beats stepping until we’re begging for Alex to drop Jah Wobble’s cool as fuck bassline. They stop short of the full 39 minutes, but we get considerably more than the three they were allowed on Top Of The Pops, and its thumping four-to-the-floor framework sharpens our minds for the main meat of the set, which is Prism album highlights like ‘H.O.M.E.’, pure trance in the literal, KLF sense of the word rather than the cheesy travesty it became associated with. It’s hypnotising, and our minds are drawn into the crazy world of the visuals behind – oceans and canyons, pyramids and skyscrapers, faces morphing into each other – David Bowie, Sid Vicious, Johnny Rotten – and of course, the ubiquitous image of Battersea Power Station floating off into in space or choreographed duplicate.
Eventually, my companion for the evening leans over and explains, in great detail, the precise theory that’s lodged itself in his mind to explain the juxtaposition of these disparate pictures. He sounds convinced. It’s the kind of out of the box thinking normally only achievable with the help of several days spent non-stop tripping on LSD. He’s had nothing stronger than two cans of lager, but that’s the effect The Orb can have on you.
The final third of the set is marked by more diverse beats, starting with a version of ‘Towers of Dub’ that emerges from a cloud of echoing harmonica and builds up to their breezy drum & bass track ‘Living In Recycled Times’ via hip-hop beats and something – don’t ask us what – from their collaborative album with the late Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry. Dots are joined between all manner of post-punk cultures, from punk itself – former Killing Joke roadie Paterson would no doubt have been pleased to be playing a venue that fellow dub lover Joe Strummer stumped up £5,000 to open in 1986 – to psychedelia, techno, ambient music, drum & bass and, above everything else, reggae and especially its echo-heavy sibling dub. But, where others crowbar their diversity into their creativity, and ask to be applauded for their inventiveness, it feels like The Orb have absorbed it all and recreated it in their own crazy, frazzled image. The punk rock bit? The fact you can take it or leave it, they don’t care.
Having teased the intro several times over other, earlier inclusions in the set, they finally end with their most widely known calling card ‘Little Fluffy Clouds’, bringing the house down all over again. It’s a fairly faithful rendition, that is until Paterson starts spinning ‘God Only Knows’ by The Beach Boys over the top. It fits like a glove, of course, and what’s more, it’s a fine sentiment to leave us with. God only knows what they’ll come up with next. But we’ll definitely want to be there when they do.
Ben Willmott