Gibson Slash

Last night was the kick off of the second iTunes Live festival. The computer giant has moved the month long festival from the modest sized ICA in Pall Mall to Koko, one of London’s leading live music venues in Camden. Last year some of the largest names in rock and pop performed at the inaugural festival and whist 2008’s line up lacks some of the superstar names who performed in 2007, they have managed to assemble a very respectable line up right in the middle of the festival season. Unlike other festivals all of the fans attending are guests and have won their tickets either through the iTunes Live site or via various fan sites.

NERD (aka The Neptunes) kicked off the festival in quite some style. The band is fronted by the record producer Pharrel Williams who has written and produced records with Nelly, Snoop Dog, Gwen Stefanni and Britney Spears, which included the cross over dance hit “Slave for 4U” which saw her career skyrocket and change direction overnight. Although I am not a great fan of their latest rock/funk record “Seeing Sounds” some of their earlier work such as “In search of…” was groundbreaking, and in many ways as important as Prince’s “Sign of the Times” double album which was released 15 years earlier. The album included the single “Lap Dance” which was a huge worldwide hit and won a Grammy Award.

The show certainly was an energetic performance and Pharrell and the rest of the band seemed very much at home in an intimate venue much smaller to than what they are used to. The band played for well over an hour with a set which spanned all of their three studio albums. The audience as expected loved every minute as this probably will be their last chance to see NERD in such an tiny venue.

The iTunes Festival is going on throughout the month of July at Koko and features a cross range of music from James Blunt to The Zutons. Further information on the event and how to win tickets can be found at the iTunes Live Festival website however most of the tickets for the future shows probably have been already won.

Written by John Rahim

Posted by John Rahim, filed under LIVE reviews. Date: July 2, 2008, 11:22 am | No Comments »