Live Review: The Libertines @ the O2 Arena, London

Five minutes before The Libertines appear on stage at the O2 for the final show of their UK arena tour, out strolls Jack Jones – a scraggy-haired Welshman currently living in the back of a van.

He reels off a couple of his own quick-witted, urban poems about drugs and Poundland. It all feels very Libertines, if you can ignore the vastness of the venue and the tight, security-patrolled surroundings (which is like ignoring sand in the Sahara). Following their comeback, one thing you can’t accuse the band of is a lack of ambition.

Beyond the occasionally out of tune music, tonight is also a cinematic experience. Hanging high and big behind drummer Gary Powell is a screen that hops between black and white images of dead stars, from the very recent (David Bowie) to the not-so-recent (Tony Hancock — a noted hero of Pete Doherty‘s).

More telling is the crackled, monotone live footage of mostly Carl Barât and Doherty that shares the screen. If there is any doubt in the romantic myth of The Libertines, compiled of fabled break-ins, arrests and fallouts; drugs, rehabs and England, it’s clear how they want themselves to be remembered: nuzzled up between their idols.

The resonating size of this place morphs their sound into quasi-chamber music, at odds with their punk backbone that has always pointed towards a knees-up grogshop-band. A gifted, influential one at that. ‘Barbarians‘, the opening track on last year’s ‘Anthems For Doomed Youth‘ album, rolls forth first to cheers that sound more customary for being the first song of the set than any real hankering.

A genuine lush of love spews up in the room, however, when early b-side ‘The Delaney’ is played next, the incendiary chorus of “No, no no! Yeah, yeah, yeah!” throbs the spine. Familiarity breeds no contempt, something they must know because only a quarter of the set is made up of newer tunes, these including ‘Heart Of The Matter‘ (with a confusingly haphazard intro) and ‘Gunga Din‘, which by the exalted reaction of the crowd could one day be as cherished as their older numbers.

It’s the older jigs that do the best damage. ‘Horrorshow‘ rips at the ears while a sucrose ‘What Katie Did‘ has Barât sweeping his best Frank Sinatra poses across the floor, microphone in hand, and ‘Vertigo‘s confrontational riff still attacks better than any of the leather-jacketed imitators that have tried and failed to fill their boots.

Barât tinkles a Union Jack-clad piano on ‘You’re My Waterloo‘, but the most unexpected moment of the evening is the four heeled women that pile on stage together. Draped in oversized red military jackets (and not much else), they vamp on the spot to ‘Boys In The Band‘. For the rest of the set, they serve drinks intermittently on a tray to the nowadays older-looking men in the band. Somehow, cabaret has found its way into The Libertines’ act.

Only Alex Turner has matched Doherty’s poetic patois in post-Millennium British guitar music, so one wonders at Doherty’s thoughts if he could see the man stood up in the seating area, arms spread wide, head stuffed in a baseball cap as he unwittingly sings along to that most trenchant of patriotic lines on ‘Time For Heroes‘, “There are fewer more distressing sight than that of an Englishman in a baseball cap”. A golden wink of irony if ever there was one.

“London, you’re the best!”, Barât shouts towards the end, and this the first real sign of any outward recognition from the band. It’s a laconic Libertines on parade, sometimes missing lyrics here and there, not wholly unrecognisable from the last time they were in London at Alexandra Palace in 2014, just less doughty on a bigger platform.

Bassist John Hassell looks forlorn out to the side. And whereas Doherty and Barât’s routine of sharing microphones is usually so fluid, this time it’s checked by the added distance between them. Doherty, indie’s anti-hero, even confesses with a smidge of nerves that, “it’s all too much for my little brain to take in,” before taking a tumble not long after in all the frothy excitement of the final song ‘Don’t Look Back Into The Sun‘.

The Albion ship might have set sail since their hiatus, but a full house and songs that still mean so much to people mean it’s still very much visible on the horizon.

(Steven White)