Noah and the Whale – Manchester Cathedral 03/07/10

There aren’t many bands that can match the majesty of their surroundings when playing in a cathedral, and even fewer could do so whilst singing songs about one night stands. But Noah and the Whale have long since stopped being subject to usual standards. Riding on the crest of the wave of new folk of the past few years, they pricked the public consciousness with their whistley, joyful single ’5 Years Time’. Whilst the song has since gone on to be the soundtrack to many montages on BBC mission documentaries, the band have far from kept to the jolly high spirit that the song was written in.

A few hundred miles away, Laura Marling is at Hop Farm, having finished a set at the festival of the same name, but her spectre looms large over Manchester Cathedral. Following a well publicised break up with Noah’s frontman Charlie Fink, she’s since moved on to date the Marcus Mumford of Mumford & Sons. Charlie, it seems, has not moved on with such pace, having written a concept album about the struggle of getting over the relationship. Though her name isn’t explicitly mentioned, that the young songstress is sat somewhere else with another of folk’s new stars has a much bigger bearing on proceedings than the religious surroundings.

The set is mostly made up of tracks from that record, First Days Of Spring, which makes for a beautiful if somewhat awkward performance. When the modern construction was first finished in 1882, few probably envisaged that a man with immaculate curly hair would stand upon it’s altar declaring “last night I slept with a stranger/since the first time since you left”. But it’s a testament to the beauty of the work that the songs only seem so marginally out of place. Backed with a small brass section and three gospel singers, the band play a series of emotionally harrowing songs that are only extenuated by the superb acoustics of the venue.

Most heartbreaking of all is the contrast between earlier works and later efforts. Fink seems to have aged twenty years in the space of two, which truly makes it feel like a show of two halves. The broken cries of “you’re talking like a stranger/So I don’t know what to do/So I’m callous and I’m cruel/To everyone but you” of ‘Our Window’ are particularly dark when compared to the jokey tones of “maybe I just need a change/maybe I just need a new cologne” from debut album opener “2 Atoms In A Molecule”. Sonically, they’ve matured an awful lot too, and the complexity and brilliance of recent works shine brighter when compared to the simple jingle jangle of ‘Mary’ and ‘Shape of my Heart’.

The band leave it to the encore until they give the crowd what most of them have been waiting for, with ’5 Years Time’ being the ultimate proof that, whilst Noah and the Whale have undoubtedly improved with the heartache, they don’t quite have the same skill at making people move their feet. Not that the band seem that bothered. This looks to be their final show of the year as they complete their third studio album, finishing the set with a track from it. Called ‘L.I.F.E.G.O.E.S.O.N.’, it’s probably fair to say that there’s still some healing to go before they write another song that soundtracks Halcyon River Diaries again, but when you can put on a performance as enchanting as this, it barely matters.