Painful
There are times when you think that certain people are only in a band because they are friends with the rest of the group. When a member of The Rapture spends a big chunk of a set banging a cow bell, which is tested thoroughly in the sound check, you might be well justified in wondering what they are doing in the band.
After two songs, the cow bell is set down and replaced with a sax. This is when it starts to feel as if four separate songs are being played at the same time. None of the band seem to be working together and they could easily be playing four different sets in four different venues right now. This is followed by an electro-rave track, then a change of bassist and then the drummer simply stops playing his drums for a wander around the stage. Don’t forget the cow bell and dancing either.
Genre-straddling is all well and good if you can sit comfortably in the genres that you are straddling. When, however, you cannot do true justice to anything except prancing around pretending that you are a ‘90s Brit-Pop band perhaps you should consider going back to basics.
Lots of people leave during the set yet a large proportion of people seem to provide a name-coinciding rapturous applause for The Rapture as their set changes from dance, to rock, to indie and back.
Like mature cheese, The Rapture are not for everybody – and they require an eclectic taste at that. The problem is that it honestly feels as if they are lacking the talent to justify their following.