Summer In The City:  Royal Blood + Maximo Park + Pixies

Castlefield Bowl, Manchester

3/5

THE Pixies have got a lot to prove on the back of poorly received comeback album Indy Cindy and a bassist on constant spin drive.

Yet two minutes into opening number U-Mass, when Black Francis unleashes a hackle-raising howl, most doubts over the wisdom of the Boston quartet continuing on the heritage rock circuit nonetheless evaporate.

An alternative indie-rock force for almost 30-years, they were at the forefront when it came to opening the doors to commercial success for the likes of Royal Blood. 

The Brighton duo share the headliner’s ability to play noise-rock while remaining in thrall to strong pop melodies, with Little Monster and Figure It Out the aural equivalent of Led Zeppelin pistol-whipping the White Stripes. 

Their epic rock riffs hook in the audience from the onset but Maximo Park have to work hard to command attention. 

The Newcastle quintet’s moody electro-pop numbers such as Leave This Island fall flat on this balmy summer evening and it’s not until Paul Smith, part light entertainer and part Freddie Mercury, fronts up with fidgety keyboards and punchy post-Futureheads choruses on Give, Get, Take and Apply Some Pressure that the band get the crowd going.

There’s no such problem for the Pixies, who gouge their way through 27 tracks at a ferociously breakneck speed. 

Self-aware enough to realise that people want to hear their classic back catalogue, they put their interpersonal difficulties and contrarian nature to one side to deliver a solid show of indie disco favourites.

Wave Of Mutilation — a punk-pop punch of surrealism — and Isla De Encanta — which rattles along like a surf Motorhead — still sound utterly unique. 

And if Here Comes Your Man and Tame miss the husky backing vocals of Kim Deal then Paz Lenchantin, who’s previously played with A Perfect Circle, slots into the poisoned-chalice bassist role seamlessly on the scratchy dance of Bagboy.

The band’s first new song since 2004, it raises expectations high for fresh material that they subsequently fail to deliver on Greens And Blues and Magdalena 318. The pace notably drops during these numbers, which manage to be the one thing that was always anathema to the Pixies — unremarkable. 

There’s a certain irony when Francis asks on the former: “If I ever seem a little strange/Would you excuse me please?”

There’s thankfully enough moments of beautiful strangeness over the course of the 90-minute set to forgive such self-indulgences and, typically oddball, they end with sprawling noise-rock favourite Vamos. 

This gives Joey Santiago the opportunity to take centre stage as he walks around with two guitars strapped around his neck before finally opting for a solo jack plug.

It’s a low-key and awkwardly meandering end to a set packed with short, sharp punches. But it proves that the Pixies are still in control of the game.