From the coffee-table to Castlegar, Morcheeba have made the transition from slinky, trip-hop underdogs to festival-headlining top banana. Everybody knows 'em, but knowledge comes at a price, and Morcheeba now have to tread that fine line marked "cred or dead".
Having seduced the world with their sultry second album, Big Calm, Morcheeba decided it was time to lighten up and write some poppy tunes which would get them dancing at the dinner-party. The result, last year's Fragments of Freedom, was a fragmented affair, and while some of the tunes were Morcheeeba at their freshest and funkiest, others were dangerously veering towards the kind of AOR soul which made M People go stale pretty quickly.
It's Saturday night in Galway, it's the June Bank Holiday weekend, and it's time to grab your handbag and head down to Castlegar Sportsgrounds, where Morcheeba are headlining the Heineken Green Energy Extravaganza. Luckily, there are no punters dancing around their handbags in the big top, so Morcheeba haven't sunk completely into cheesy territory - they haven't yet become part of the processed.
"We're gonna raise the roof tonight," declares singer Skye Edwards, but really Morcheeba aren't about raising the roof, just maybe levering it gently, just to let a bit of light in. Upbeat single, Be Yourself is fast and fun, but the slow, skanking Trigger Hippy has a stronger kick. There's no doubt that Skye is a star, but she still needs a vehicle: and the Godfrey brothers are the drivers. Guitarist Ross Godfrey keeps his foot firmly down on the wah-wah pedal, while DJ Paul Godfrey steers confidently with a pair of decks, scratching his way deftly between the beats, and doing just enough patter to please the crowd. The band also features a violinist who doubles on the trumpet, and a backing singer who gives Skye all the vocal support she needs.
You can understand, though, why the Godfrey brothers wanted to pump up the tempo a bit - it gets a bit boring swaying like a sapling for the entire gig, and having the odd wig-out tune breaks things up a bit. So there's a disco bit, and a country-funk jam, and finally there's Rome Wasn't Built in a Day, which should have been renamed Search For a Hero 2000. Sometimes the price of fame is just too high and while Morcheeba negotiate that tricky tightrope towards superstardom, they should take care not to give away all their most valuable assets.
