Goddess ten years on: how BANKS gained immortality

This description has changed over time to suit the ever-changing landscape of storytelling, with these deities growing more fallible with every iteration of their lore. Similarly, for those really in tune with pop music, Jillian Rose Banks, better known by the mononym BANKS, has been one of the guiding lights of midnight-hued, emotionally charged sounds since the early 2010s. Her music has shifted ever-so slightly since 2014’s debut Goddess, but that album is still seen as a true northern star of unconventional pop sonics, spawning tracks that may not have ignited the charts, but did ignite a visceral flame within people – attaching itself to a seminal era loaded with foundational memories for so many.

Those memories are exactly the reason London’s KOKO is at capacity tonight. A decade and some change on from when she first stepped on stage at the venue in support of the record, BANKS is set to commemorate ten years of Goddess, at this point a veteran artist who has experienced so much in comparison to where she was when she first touched down in Mornington Crescent all those years ago. I was at that first show, which took place months before the album was released, to see her preview tracks from the record as well as her extremely well received London EP. Things were different back then; it wasn’t social media virality, or streaming playlist omnipresence, or even a touch of good fortune that got people on the road to superstardom… blogs could single handedly make or break a career. Any combination of of the hundreds of music discovery platforms out there could to take you to a #1 on Hype Machine (remember Hype Machine?) and suddenly you were the next big thing. Artists such as Charli XCX and MARINA were lauded as blog darlings for a melodramatic take of electronically infused pop that was being hailed as a revolution in a sound that had been used as a dirty word at the height of the era that preceded it. BANKS was also a dominant name in that faction, and her first show at KOKO felt like a real peak in that dark pop movement – shrouded in blood-red lighting, obscured with fog… an almost gothic enigma.

The woman that enters the stage today, still obscured (only this time by a funeral-esque veil), feels slightly less mysterious, but is met with that same palpable excitement; only this time it’s for the past rather than the future. The opening bars of "Alibi" are met with instant screams from the crowd, some of whom, myself included, have given up on trying to see the stage through the densely packed crowd and have turned to their friends to sing each word either in each other’s faces, towards the sky, or directly back at Banks herself. It would be remiss to say that tonight’s performance at KOKO transports those in attendance right back to that night in March 2014, because it doesn’t. Tonight feels like as much a celebration of Banks’ journey as it does her past. Classics like "Brain" feel way more refined than they did a decade ago; a higher emphasis put on her voice and the emotion in her delivery than the freewheeling devastation of the early years. "Waiting Game" feels like an exercise in the fragility within her words rather than the overpowering stomp of the song’s climax. It’s little touches like this that actually make the evening feel like a more intimate affair than all those years ago, and shows that Banks understands the importance of these songs. They’re embedded into the psyche of those who are here to experience them – they’re not packed into this crowded room to see the same show they did ten years ago, they’re here to experience those same emotions that they did the first time they pushed play on the album. That separation is widened even more when she takes to the piano for "Someone New," a song she didn’t even perform when touring the record the first time round, but one that is appreciated even more than the album’s more typical standouts.

Taking some time to acknowledge not only the journey she has been on since the album’s release, but the journey of those that have been with her since, BANKS says “These songs changed my life, but the fact that they changed your life or got you through something means the world” before the opening bars of "Change" – a song that feels like a genuine emotional apex in a performance full of special moments. Re-entering for an encore of "Before I Ever Met You" and a live debut brand new single "I Hate Your Ex-Girlfriend," Banks displays her more kinetic side, showing a more up-front facet of her magnetism before one final act of tenderness; handing out flowers to her crowd before leaving the stage once more.

While Greek goddesses have acquired the ability to cease to exist over time, tonight has proven that the songs within BANKS’ Goddess are truly immortal. Whether we like it or not, we will all eventually return to the ether, but our memories, and indeed the art that soundtracked those moments, will live forever. It won’t ever be 2014 ever again, but by breathing new life into these songs tonight at KOKO, Banks has revitalised all those special experiences connected with what is a true contemporary pop masterpiece, integrating a decade’s worth of expertise of operating at the very pinnacle of cutting-edge, R&B-infused pop. We all grow older, most of us grow wiser, but music and its meaning is completely eternal.

Setlist

Alibi
Goddess
Brain
Waiting Game
Someone New
Drowning
Warm Water
Beggin for Thread
This Is What It Feels Like
Bedroom Wall
Change
Before I Ever Met You
I Hate Your Ex-Girlfriend