Camden New Journal - Music: The Concretes

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The Review - MUSIC - grooves with CHARLOTTE CHAMBERS
Published: 31 May 2007

The Concretes

Don’t mention the missing band member

PREVIEW: THE CONCRETES
Luminaire
by Richard Osley

IT’S a bit like the way they made episodes of Inspector Morse after John Thaw died. Just put the sidekick centre stage, the producers thought, call it ‘Lewis’ and people will still be happy. Think they did the same with Taggart – it’s no good.
Singer Victoria Bergsman hasn’t died, she’s gone off to make whistling songs with fellow Scandiland acts Peter, Bjorn and John – but the principle is the same with The Concretes, who are struggling on without her and pretending like nobody is missing from the group.
She left late last year after helping to form the band in Stockholm a decade earlier.
In between, Bergsman helped make two icy-cool albums which turned The Concretes from an unknown band into a must-see act.
Lilting lo-fi tunes like Chosen One and Warm Night, and their amazing cover of Miss You stick in the mind. One minute they were just a band that the Grooves page banged on about and people said ‘yeah, whatever’, the next everybody was name dropping them at parties and trying to copy one of Bergsman’s art experiment haircuts.
Trouble now is that they are stuck with the huge job of filling Bergman’s shoes. Without her fragile, almost off-key voice – where do they go from here? Find out next week when they swing back this way, docking at the Luminaire in Kilburn on Wednesday night. I’ll be interested to see how they get on.

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