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The Streets, O2 Academy

Mike Skinner goes all rap Sinatra and does it his way with his retirement gig

by bruce.dessauSaturday, 5 March 2011

Mike Skinner: Is it really the end of the road for the pop pioneer?

Grown men with bulging muscles and tattoos were crying in Brixton last night. And not just the man at the front who got unexpectedly kicked when Mike Skinner decided to go crowd-surfing. It was Skinner's very last gig before he pursues film-making, novels or roadsweeping, depending which interview you believe, so could he finish with a bang?

Well, he certainly started with a bang. The gig hit the ground running, quite literally in the case of dreadlocked co-vocalist Kevin Mark Trail, who spent almost the entire 90 minutes on stage hurtling around, while the star of the night preferred to bounce on the spot like a kangaroo or perch on the monitor leading the audience singalongs.

With an extremely good valedictory album, Computers and Blues, and a fantastic back catalogue there was no time to be wasted. Skinner might have been caught up and arguably overtaken by the likes of Tinie, Tinchy and Plan B, but early in the set his 2002 single "Let's Push Things Forward" still sounded like a contemporary slice of propulsive urban soul.

While the incessant slam of the beats plus guest co-vocalist Rob Harvey from The Music and a tight band fleshing out the sound things moved at an incredible lick, Skinner span glorious yarns on stage. A decade on from his start he is still a bit of a soppy old romantic. On the recent track "OMG" he bemoaned his girlfriend changing her Facebook status to "in a relationship" until his eyes lit up when he realised she was in a relationship with him.

It was during "OMG" that the 32-year-old went crowd-surfing, pleading with his audience to be gentle. His new album explores the fact that while we are more connected than ever through technology, we are less connected too, yet in a live context Skinner certainly knows how to connect. Quite literally, when someone grabbed his foot and he kicked them, before apologising once back on terra firma and handing them some conciliatory lager.

Following recent gigs by others in London where the sound has been decidedly lumpy, Skinner's clever, tongue-twisting lyrics – “Frank Bruno’s nose has seen too many blows”, on break-up classic "We Can Never Be Friends" – were clear as a bell, albeit a very loud bell that left your eardrums rattling. Like the Beastie Boys at their most boisterous, there is a hint of a heavy-metal tendency to Skinner's recent work, explicitly on "Going Through Hell" which cranked up the amps to 12 and threatened to bring down the balconies.

But it was the pop hits that really worried the brickwork. The set finished, inevitably, with "Dry Your Eyes" and the packed house swaying as one. Skinner was clearly moved himself when he sang the refrain of “it’s over”. Then a quick, manly "thank you" and he was off. There had to be an encore though, and it had to include "Fit But You Know It", the hip-hop pop knees-up that Madness might have written if they were 20 years younger. Then after stripping to the waist for "Going Through Hell" and the subsequent firestorm of screeching guitars, Skinner really was gone. Somehow I cannot believe he will not return. On this evidence he surely loves performing too much to give it up. In fact this is not quite the end. A gig in Newcastle and an appearance at this summer's Wireless Festival are already on the cards. But Brixton will be tough to beat.

Watch The Streets perform "Dry Your Eyes"

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Skinner certainly knows how to connect. Quite literally, when someone grabbed his foot and he kicked them

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