They are dance, they are punk. They are analogue, they are digital. They are symbols of aching Brooklyn cool fronted by a self-proclaimed “fat guy in a t-shirt doing all the singing”. They are the fiercely independent club-playing act now signed to Sony and playing outdoors in front of 15-odd thousand.
James Murphy and LCD Soundsystem have made a career of the oxymoronic - a Schrodinger’s band, and knowingly self-aware enough to own it. They arrive onstage to no fanfare and opened the show declaring “we don’t do hits” - and then follow with 18 of them.
Maybe not all hits commercially - but culturally, bringing together a rabid audience who’ve grown older with the band and are grateful at any chance to catch them after their five-year hiatus, accusations of them being a legacy act be damned - as one item at their merch stall reads: “My middle-aged friend saw LCD Soundsystem and all I got was this lousy t-shirt”.
At one point, a full wedding party snakes through the crowd, bride still in pure-white dress and wedge heels.
Certainly hits too in terms of sheer visceral power - after threatening the foundations of the Olympia last year, this time their mountains of analogue synths besiege the 12th century Malahide Castle with an onslaught not seen since the Boyne - most notably on ‘Yeah’, which remains volcanic in its intensity over its ten-minute build and attack. It’s absurd that they can afford to leave a moment like this mid-set.
‘Tribulations’ is knocked out of the way early, complete with new horn motifs to complement its spiky synth riff. ‘Daft Punk Is Playing at My House’, missing from last year’s sets, made a welcome return, sped up and laden with cowbell. Of the new songs, from last year’s American Dream, it’s the ten-minute triptych ‘How Do You Sleep’ that stands out - featuring Al Doyle playing violin over the militaristic beats that open this paean to Murphy’s lost friendship with fellow DFA records founder and now legal adversary Tim Goldsworthy. It’s the kind of monumental song that draws a natural line under things - perhaps fully removing the new LCD from the DFA era, no longer obsessed with New York. As Murphy says when introducing the band - “we’re LCD Soundsystem, from all over”.
Murphy himself is another bundle of contradictions onstage - the punk singer who discovered his croon, yelp and falsetto, the awkward man of the sheepish “hi guys” crowd greetings, so sure and confident in doing what he loves.
“We came on a little early ‘cos we wanted to play longer for you”, Murphy says, citing a strict curfew. They end up pushing the show out to two hours fifteen minutes, to benefit those who got stuck on the DART on the way to the show.
With no discernible encore break, the emotional hits came. ‘All My Friends’ has transcended itself over time - its narrative of a hedonistic night out when you’re old enough to know better has become a torch song for anyone who was indie in the noughties, all building to that binding refrain - “where are your friends tonight?”
That would normally signal the end, but there’s time for one more this time. ‘New York I Love You, but You’re Bringing Me Down’, and its endless pauses closed the show, with Murphy triumphantly holding their digital countdown clock for all to see they stretched the ballad to the dying seconds.
“We gotta go post the bail so we don’t end up in jail tomorrow”, he joked. Anyone in the audience would’ve taken the rap if they’d stayed another two hours - and kept playing the hits.