The Rapture

On the face of things, The Rapture are an odd proposition. Warm and amiable in their pre-set address to the crowd, they seem every inch the street-keen, rave-hall Italian New Yorkers. The kind who re-christen their hometown 'New Yoik' and who's words float like chunky graff in colour bubbles. Ever seen that cheesefest The Wanderers...? It seems strange, then, that when the music starts tonight those hometown boys raised on blared street feeling are crammed into silent cab rides through the city. Removed from the junket, in the minutes of their music they become outsiders cutting a rude path through the hustle and humanity of a place that art says transcends the rigid grid on which it sits. It seems strange, on the face of things, until you realise that transcendence of the static is precisely the task The Rapture seek to set themselves.

As one-paced as they come, for the most part it simply doesn't matter. All that matters is that there is a pace, and while every beat may skip along - beneath a flattering spray of disco hi-hat - at roughly the same speed I push my way to the bar tonight, it's how they use that stubborn, laconic beat that is vital. Forging new alleyways through the grids of Vito's drumming, braying sax and shattered guitar riffs divide the light, transforming The Rapture's glitterball metronome into a lively, strobelit heartbeat - ticking by like 3am motorway bulbs through an open window. And their throats are as cold _as_; chilled raw and blue by the city's night air. Luke Jenner throws his bottled voice up into it, giving melody to the constant chorus of sirens.

There are plenty, perhaps quite rightly, who say I'm making too much of The Rapture's music. Hailed by many as the first champions of all this disco-punk-funk-whatever of the few years past, their laylines remain easy to trace backwards. This is exemplified by the single 'Get Myself Into It': it recalls The Police in the verses and The Stereo MCs in the chorus, and yet still somehow manages to sound well decent. And it is this decency that sets them apart, and above - who here in the Academy tonight can honestly say they're dancing as they would to 'Call On Me', or JT? It is also this decency which has been recognised by the more eminent of those that followed in their path - see the po-faced ordainments of Bloc Party vs the cuddlier, muckier Battle as clear proof (no-one wants to dance with an emotional slut). Their groove is parochial yet cosmopolitan, detached yet infectious, static yet transitory. It's the trappings of these contradictions that cause all the curiousity and then the words, since the hype began those years ago.

Days and nights which seem an incredibly long way off now. Tonight, The Rapture are seamless and experienced, a state of affairs that sees their cultured holler shown up as pretty shallow, however cool and naïve the shaggy-haired Jenner and jerk-held Gabriel Andruzzi are in their addresses to the audience. After the first couple of songs, the only signature missing is Andruzzi's cowbell and... I've no idea why it is so much easier to dance to a song that busts the cowbell. Perhaps it's 'cause it adds a newer, tinnier rhythm to a mix that has grown used to the absence of bass and now adopts a leaner, whiter rhythm. Or maybe it's just because I'm a drastic little shit. Either way, the whole of Islington Academy is on the strut, industry and competition winners alike, and The Rapture are leading the party.

This band aren't one that is built to hold attentions for an hour, but they don't begin to suffer from it tonight. It's enough that they don't mind merging in with the background every ten minutes to allow us breath to test the atmosphere and the others caught in it - even through the new material that steady beat keeps ticking over. Which makes listening out for new song 'The Sound' - a track Xfm's Ian Baker was adamant would "take your heads right off" - difficult; through a glut of new stuff showcased tonight, (from the imminent Pieces of The People We Love), your ears pick up glitches and turns of verse, but not coherent wholes. Instead, we're left with an overall impression of The Rapture - one that is best realised in the foot-shaped indents in the Academy's floor and in the skidding guitar of their most famous song. Which is all well and good, but sometimes it just feels like they forgot to show up to their own party.