Day 1- Tuesday July 22

 

Bastian Baker, Grande Scène, 6:30pm-8pm

Lausanne singer Bastian Baker replaces last minute French singer Gaëtan Roussel who was injured in his last show and did not recover on time. Despite being added last minute, Bastian Baker feels totally at home on the main stage where he also played last year! He and his band delight the public with their catchy pop-rock songs. He himself is extremely engaging live, I saw him at Caribana in June, at Gurten Festival just a week before Paléo and I didn’t get bored so he must be pretty good! During a song he even jumps off the stage and takes a stroll into the crowd and gets in front of the sound system singing from there, pretty brave! He impresses the audience when playing “I’d Sing For You” to which they sing along and wave hands. He closes with an encore: the folky and lively single “79 Clifton Street”, a sea of people clapping hands and singing along to the lines “And if you take my hand, you take my hand uuuuu uuuuu uuuuu”.

 

Jake Bugg, Les Arches, 8pm-9pm

The young Nottingham lad is only 20 and has two albums behind. His success calls to mind the early success Arctic Monkeys had. But this is not the only similarity between him and the Sheffield indie-rockers. His voice in the new songs taken from his last album Shangri La reminds Alex Turner’s poignant voice in their early works. He seems to come out from the ‘80s with that voice when he intones his country battle-horse “Lightning Bolt”, which makes people jump and sing along. When singing “Broken”, he truly seems to convey that feeling in the Paléo audience with his voice that although being pretty still seems broken at the same time. His performance of “Broken” already struck me last year when he played it at Montreux Jazz Festival. He plays frantically during “Slumville Sunrise”, where the lyrics unfold very fast. Jake Bugg’s music is great to hear live, he plays and he sings well. The only disturbing element of his live show here at Paléo is that he does not or hardly ever smiles and that his connection to the audience is non existent except a “Thank you very much” uttered quickly at the end of his show. It’s a pity because with his talent he could make crowds go literally crazy if only there was that bit more of a connection to the public. Still, nothing to say about the way he plays and sings and of course there’s always time for improvement, after all he is still pretty new to all this.

 

Thirty Seconds To Mars, Grande Scène, 9pm-10:15pm

The three Californians have an incredible energy live, led by the charismatic (and handsome) Jared Leto, whom you may have seen in some movies and advertisings, they impress the public. Jared Leto, long brown hair and long beard is all dressed in white, he looks like Jesus, throughout the concert however he’ll become a God! Their show is full of surprises; giant coloured balloons are released during their set. When they play the majestic “This Is War” the band makes the audience move “To the right, to the left” according to the song lyrics. At a certain point Jared Leto wants “someone from Switzerland” to go on stage. So off one guy going up on stage and when Jared Leto asks him where he is from he answers “Kosovo”. A second try, a little boy goes up on stage and it turns out he is from France and not Switzerland. The third guy going up is eventually really from Switzerland so that the singer is glad he finally got someone from Switzerland on stage with him. Funny entertaining moments! Towards the end of the concert Jared Leto bursts out with “Who wants to come on stage with Thirty Seconds To Mars?” tons of hands are raised to the sky. He picks around 30 people, if not more, so that in the end the main stage is full of fans! Epic! There are not many bands who would do this kind of thing and this is certainly entertaining especially at a festival, where people are not necessarily there to see all the bands so this kind of behaviour is great to get all the attention. Beside this their rock music got less dark lately so that it is accessible to more people.

 

The Black Keys, Grande Scène, 11:30pm-1am

They are not just two tonight drummer Patrick Carney and guitarist and singer Dan Auerbach, but four. The Black Keys take the audience straight away in their blues sonorities mixed with electric guitar riffs. They present their last album Turn Blue, which if listened to at home is pretty quiet but live is much more lively and rock, with songs like “Fever” getting the audience dancing and singing along. The best bit however is when they play “Lonely Boy” for that song everybody shakes its body like the guy in the official video for the song, unable to stop until the end of it. They remind me of Kings Of Leon’s sonorities of the American South when playing their lively new tune “Gotta Get Away”. They leave the stage and come back for an encore: Dan Auerbach announces that “It’s gonna be just the two of us for this one”. The lights are turned off and they intone the magnificent ballad “Little Black Submarines” which starts slowly and then, as soon as the drums and the electric guitar take their place becomes a rock tune, beautiful! They play many songs from their opus El Camino, like “Money Maker” and “Gold On The Ceiling” which electrify the audience with their banging rhythms. And, “Run Right Back” with its constant drums and the guitar making that electric sounds which gives the idea of truly running.

 

 

Simona @TakeMe2aConcert