Live music is often synonymised with high-octane, high-energy excitement. The feeling the builds with a room full of people brushing up in close proximity with one another all fuelled by seeing one of their favourite artists in the flesh. While the latter part is very much true tonight, the former is less true, with the beautifully chilled Australian folk rock group THE PAPER KITES arriving with The Roadhouse Band off the back of their latest album, 2023’s At The Roadhouse, to a sold-out night at Manchester’s New Century Hall.
As the number of bodies in the room continues to rise, the 8-piece band of THE PAPER KITES & The Roadhouse Band stroll onto the dimly lit stage, sat before large imposing lights behind them. The lights slightly raise as vocalist Sam Bentley begins to sing soft opener Between The Houses, fading in and out in tandem with his sultry vocals, before a wall of beautiful backing vocals welcome the full band into the fray. They control the mood of the room masterfully with their soft luscious tones, leaving the floor swaying along with them from the off. The influence of THE EAGLES is very present, with the frequent mass of luxurious velvet vocals, atmospheric pedal steel and country pop twang caressing the whole set into a beautiful dreaming meander through their discography.
The room is silent such is the hold the band have over every single molecule in their presence, scarcely more noticeable than during the incredibly delicate Nothing More Than That, the soft creak of the floorboards under the weight of the silent swaying souls engrossed in the soothing auditory bliss. Opener ROSIE CARNEY returns to the stage to feature on the yearning ballad By My Side leaving every couple in the room swaying in one another’s arms. In an incredibly novel moment, the band abandon all amplified instruments and the whole 8-piece gather around a microphone at the front of the stage for an acoustic rendition of fan favourite Bloom. A sea of phones rise for the novel moment, which is gracefully replaced by a choir of the whole room during the chorus oohs.
Following a brief intermission, they return for a rockier number in June’s Stolen Car, and the whole band is now standing for the more powerful of their tunes. Closing the set with ADRIENNE LENKER’s Anything followed by the five original members around the microphone again for an acoustic rendition of Paint is a heart wrenching conclusion. As they depart, an eruption in the crowd grows to earn a more than justified encore. They return for perhaps their most pop leaning track of the night in Electric Indigo which once again has the whole room swaying along. It is in the tiny subtleties that THE PAPER KITES are truly a level above. The harmony and balance of the whole outfit is astounding, arranging simplicity into a beautiful calm, leaving you with the feeling that all might well be alright.
