how long will you stay tonight?
Language of Flowers open with the beautiful intro of Where You Belong and I have not felt this strongly for a band for a long time. I am not the only one. When Tara Simpson sings the first two lines for us, it is just as much we in the audience who ask how long her band will stay tonight.
I have been waiting for this moment. I think back and try to understand. It all started a day in September 2005. I thought I was tired of music. I was convinced I could no longer admire a band in the same way as I had loved Pulp, Oasis, and David Bowie in my teenage years. That naive adoration felt like a relict from a lost age. By chance I happened to hear the song Le Monster by My Favorite. After a week of listening, there was only one band in my life. My Favorite disbanded ten days after I discovered them. My Favorite had existed for fifteen years and I never got to see them live. It only happens a few times each decade, but sometimes a band can change everything. My Favorite was such a band. I became bitter.
It was so obvious that I needed a new band to adore. Language of Flowers came out of nowhere. Their debut album Songs About You was released in late 2004 but I heard Language of Flowers for the first time as recently as February this year. After a few months with Songs About You, I had fallen in love with all songs except Christmas. Songs About You is still the best album I have heard and my love for pop music as strong now as ever. Outside it had become dark. This concert evening had started two hours earlier.
Emma's House at the venue Mejeriet is not empty. Instead, it is warm and welcoming. It feels unreal, and my expectations for the evening are so high. The audience is interested in music, the atmosphere very good, the"everyone is there"-feeling comes even before the support band starts to play. The Budgies are a quartet from Lund and thus play in their hometown tonight. Their super-fast twee with 1:40-songs charms the audience. It would be wrong to say that their sound is unique, but it strikes me that I never hear this kind of music live. The band plays so fast on the instruments that the drums and guitars would probably break if it were not for the music being soft and kind.
Merz then comes in and performs his more electronic songs. He says that the stage is bizarre and he certainly got a point. The concerts are held at the small room at Mejeriet. That is a wise choice, but it is still absurd to have a stage two meter above the floor in a rather small room. Merz seems to be a nice guy but he does not play my kind of music. I try to be discreet when I look at the watch.
Tara along with the four boys of her band enter the stage sometime after eleven pm and we are back where this text started. Where You Belong sounds like a dream until it stops and Tara says "We are Language of Flowers...from Belfast". As the second song, the drummer starts to play the great intro of If It's Not You. "Their best song", I think before they change their minds, instead playing Who You're With. I close my eyes and hear Tara sing won't you come back to me, because i wanna be the one who you're with. The big pop dream is then realised. Many of us have been waiting for If It's Not You. There are no lyrics to this song on the website but the pop kids know the song text anyway. The sound during the show is very high, at our loudest we in the audience almost outsing Tara. There is spontaneous dance and sing along to my favourite song. It is so easy to love tonight's audience. If It's Not You is the best song in the set and I am satisfied. They can play anything afterwards. We get to hear three new songs. The last is the best one.
Tara picks up a guitar after that. Someone behind me whispers "big guitar for a little girl" and I can not help but smile. "Songs About You" is added by another boy who apparently has seen the band before. Langauge of Flowers then end the concert with Tara Mascara. A boy and a girl on my left sing along throughout the whole song and it is so beautiful. I like them.
Language of Flowers have written so many perfect songs for their debut album. Some of them are left out of the live set. Many people get sad because the concert does not last longer, but the band is applauded back to the scene where they play the happy Botanic Gardens as the encore. I miss I Don't Care at All, but it does not matter. The Popaganda festival got to hear seven songs by Language of Flowers. We got nine and I heard my two favourite songs Where You Belong and If It's Not You.
After the concert, I see Tara in front of the stage. I walk to her and thank her for a wonderful concert before she goes to the interview with the student radio indie program Tandem Pop. I can not describe how happy If It's Not You made me.
Three days later, I realise that Language of Flowers' show at Mejeriet on Saturday May 27 was much more than the finest concert of my life.
Ten out of Ten
Setlist:
(Originally published on May 30, 2006)
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