Dan Mangan, the magical (Queen Elizabeth Theatre, Oct 28, 2011)

In the dark of the Queen Elizabeth Theatre an assembled group of musicians struck up. The noise at first seemed ominous and disjointed but in time grew in structure and strength before swelling into the opening number from Oh Fortune. As finally the vocals kicked in, the lights flashed on to reveal the man of the hour, Mr. Dan Mangan, in all of his bearded glory. For the next nearly two hours his magnetism would work in unison with his talented band for a night of musical magic.

Being the Oh Fortune tour, an album that moved from singer-songwriter into a much fuller, more orchestral sound, it made sense that the show would take on that feel as well. This was accomplished through a keyboard player, violinist, and a very welcome addition of a horn, which on top of the regular three-piece backing (The Crackling) flushed the sound out quite nicely. It made already amazingly loud live numbers such as Post-War Blues (a song that needs to be heard live) that much better. In fact, as they played the majority of (if not all of) the new album things sounding so great in this nice, seated, sold-out theatre. Even the slower Daffodil was carried by Dan, and Leaves, Trees, Forest benefited from an introduction that was slightly more rare than usual on this night as Dan explained they were attempting to fit as much music in before curfew as possible. Naturally the stand-out single Rows of Houses hit its mark and resonated with the crowd, and we were quite excited to hear Dan slowly start into Jeopardy, another especially strong new song. It Starts With Them, but the latter half definitely Ends With Us as the musicians (the horns!) totally brought down the house in what I thought could have been a closing number.

With all of the new material to be heard it was almost unnecessary to dip into the back catalogue, but that of course would be a disservice to its strength. Besides, this may have been the best rendition of Baskets I have ever seen. Perhaps it was the violin that stuck around (as well as the upright bass) to back up one of the most beautiful songs going - whatever it was it was special. Sold was another more-than-welcome addition that the band has down pat, along with Road Regrets. However it is the raucous Some People that they have only improved over the years that just crashes through in the most powerful way. Yes Nice, Nice, Very Nice most definitely still has a welcome place in the show - don't ever take these gems away.

From the standing ovation that followed it was apparent that this had been a transcendental night that broke through to the audience. As Dan was mostly unaccompanied, we helped him out singing Veda Hille's role in Indie Queens. He also treated us to his beloved cover of Neutral Milk Hotel's In an Aeroplane Over the Sea before returning to the song that all of this wonderful glory seems to have built itself upon. It was a stand-up singalong for Robots and that was more than alright - people showing their sexual confidence, eh Dan? As this came to a close I hoped beyond hope that there'd be time to slip it in and could see Dan inquiring before finally making the decision that, yes, they would do So Much for Everyone. The entire band assembled front and center, and following a warm-up teaching of Oh-ooooo, Dan began into the sparse and emotional introduction to this track. In moments the band kicked in with their clap-stomp and elation swelled, as did our voices, into the pure bliss of this final shared song of a glorious night.