​Tim Hughes is left wondering how two people can make such a glorious racket on Royal Blood's return to Oxford

  • Royal Blood
  • O2 Academy Oxford
  • January 8, 2015

Rock fans have not had all that much to celebrate in recent years — what with the genre subsumed by an onslaught of commercial pop and pushed to the margins.

Even when a rocky bone is thrown, it’s usually in the shape of a heritage act. Young rock blood with mainsteam appeal has been in very short supply.

So thank the gods of rock, then, for Royal Blood. With the most successful rock album in three years, not to mention a Mercury Prize nomination, it has been hard to avoid this talented two piece from Worthing in Sussex — a place more synonymous with retired Home Counties accountants eating icecreams in deck chairs — possibly, I’d like to think, with handkerchiefs on their heads. Heaven knows what their hometown shows were like.

The most surprising thing about tonight’s sold-out, rescheduled show at a rammed O2 Academy Oxford, was that, yes, there are only two of them: bassist Mike Kerr and drummer Ben Thatcher.

We already knew that, of course, but then all sorts of trickery can be achieved in the recording studio. The wonderful truth is that their sound is faithfully reproduced live, in all its bass-shuddering, turbo-charged glory. That’s no mean feat considering their youth and waif-like appearance (by rock standards anyway).

Comparisons are irresistible with obvious influences. The ghost of Nirvana hovers over them like a dark, grungy thundercloud — dispensing sharply-honed hooks like bolts of lightning. So too are The White Stripes, Led Zeppelin, Rage Against the Machine, Queens of the Stone Age and The Kills. There are even shades of Black Rebel Motorcycle Club in their room-shaking effects-driven bass riffs.

None of it is strictly derivative though. What emerges is a skyscraping wall of metal-edged rock, but with a delicious pop-approach to melody and an ability to shift gear to something more subtle.

Stagecraft is not a strength; perhaps excusable in a youthful two-piece.

There’s no banter, scarcely any introduction, and Kerr’s movement restricted to the occasional wander away from those all-important pedals to face Thatcher, frantically pounding away beneath his baseball cap. No matter, the crowd were captivated, signalling approval with a sea of arms, extending almost to the back bar.

Then it was over. The lights were on and we were out in the street — wondering what had hit us.