Madness live review: A proper knees-up
Before I leave to see Madness, my dad, who seems to think I’m interviewing the band rather than reviewing the show, tells me frontman Suggs is a massive Chelsea fan, and I should bring that up for a bit of rapport building. Noted, I say, and march into the drizzle. Outside Morden tube station, I see a huge group of boys in Chelsea scarves and know it’s going to be a good show.
Not that cosmic coincidence is what it takes – Madness have been churning out UK top tens for decades. Their Camden show is a homecoming, the first time in 40 years they’ve returned to the KOKO, to mark the release of the 13th album, Theatre Of The Absurd Presents C’Est La Vie.
Their prolific output gets me thinking about the last ska show I went to, which, not counting cover bands in pubs, was The Specials, all the way back in 2019. The whole tube journey, I think about the late Terry Hall, and how lovely it is a band like Madness are still carrying the torch for ska. As I sat ruminating, it occurred to me that I hadn’t looked up to check the stops once, but I knew the second the old boys in pork pie hats started piling on, I was close.
Being in my early 20s and a woman, I’m in the minority at the show, but nobody asks me to name five songs, and I end up talking to a lot of people who seem thrilled someone younger is into Madness. For anyone thinking of seeing them without much clue what they’re about, my advice is to position yourself next to a middle-aged man and the teenage daughter he’s dragged along.
I overheard one dad explain the entire significance of the gig at length: “Right, so they used to be called The Invaders, and they came here years ago when pints were still less than a quid and changed their name.” It’s these men I find the most endearing. They’re decked out to the nines, many in fezzes. They take terrible pictures using only their forefingers and are absurdly polite.
The crowd absolutely made the gig, which, by all accounts, was a high-quality production I wasn’t expecting. We open with a clip of Helen Mirren reading out the lyrics to ‘C’est La Vie’, and the entire night the screen flashes with sci-fi and film clips. The show’s first half is dedicated to their new material, and the crowd starts to clamour for the old hits. “Some people are so desperate to hear the old stuff,” tuts one man next to me, and I nod like I wasn’t counting down the minutes to ‘Embarrassment.’
After a brief interval (why don’t more shows do that?), they wheel out hit after hit, and it feels like Christmas – in two senses. One, they’ve been building to this moment all night, so it’s almost euphoric when ‘One Step Beyond’ starts, but two – Madness are an inherently festive band to me. Drunk family parties always result in a good old march around to ‘House of Fun’, and that’s the energy that fills the KOKO, enthusiastic uncles on a few beers, enjoying the tunes and high on nostalgia.
Suggs announces they haven’t got time for the usual walk-off walk-on encore routine, so they’re just going for it. The opening notes of ‘Friday Night, Saturday Morning’ ring out, and a picture of Terry Hall comes onto the screen. I think about my tube journey and get chills.
