Antony And The Johnsons

I manage to get into this London show by Antony And The Johnsons by a kind of miracle, but I mainly have to thank my total devotion to the artist. Despite having had no promotion whatsoever, the show has been sold out for two months, and it comes across as / is an event with "half-open" doors for press, media, industry people and their friends. This too creates an air of expectation of something "more special" than the following dates. After the Rotterdam date/warm-up, this evening is also the official consecration of the European tour, which will resume in Italy with the Milan show on 2 May.

In the foyer of the Queen Elizabeth Hall, the feeling is simply that of waiting for a star. Familiar faces from the indie-stardom scene mingle with the satisfied, excited expressions of those clutching a ticket, and the dazed, hungry eyes of those still hoping for a last-minute return. Before the star takes the stage, Gonzales plays, ignored by most of the audience. A pause, then the Johnsons come on for a brief overture meant to introduce Antony, who appears in black on the dimly lit stage. Amid applause he sits down at the piano, in the left corner of the stage, maintaining from the start and throughout the whole concert a sober bearing bordering on detachment. It's really more concentration and tension, though, because the moment he starts singing that impression vanishes and Antony gives himself completely.

It opens with "My Lady Story", one of the weaker tracks in the repertoire, which here instead reveals its importance within the overall design, and traces the coordinates of the Johnsons' sonic architecture in its live incarnation, not far at all from the version recorded on "I Am A Bird Now": an essential, understated support in which piano, bass, acoustic guitar, cello, organ and accordion align themselves, docile handmaidens, around the main instrument. A balance and restraint that work well, even if in the long run one risks a "Madredeus effect" (everything a bit too pretty, controlled, regular).

"For Today I Am A Boy" is exceptional even without the multiplied vocals, "Cripple And The Starfish" here sounds as if sung by Holiday, swung and gurgling in the shadow of a lampshade, all its melodrama gone. A string of covers, as usual, already familiar yet still splendid: Nina Simone's "Be My Husband", David Tibet's "Soft Black Stars" and "Candy Says". There are a couple of unreleased tracks or covers I don't recognize, two episodes that finally feel alien again: an almost country ballad, very narrative and dreamlike, and a spoken, unsettling piece.

Antony proves to be at once the height of sincerity and the height of artifice. His manner and forms stop just short of the line beyond which they would seem like poses, pushing in the opposite direction (yet on the same terrain) from his ideal patron, Andy Warhol, who out of his rhetoric of poses had painted the human hypothesis of the new (in)civilization of consumerism. With Antony the scene is turned inside out like a glove, flushing out and reviving in its purity that faint glow of romanticism which, appearances notwithstanding, still lights up some recess of the psyche of us consumers of the second millennium.

Live too, Antony repeats that humble gesture of inviting illustrious guests to his court, to whom he declares himself indebted, achieving here a devastating emotional effect, on a par with the family mysticism staged with Boy George on the album. "Every artist owes what he is to someone who has meant everything to him. For me, that someone is Marc Almond." Marc comes on stage and apologizes that he won't be singing at his best due to the long convalescence following last year's serious motorcycle accident. Instead, the Antony/Marc duet on "River Of Sorrow" is without doubt the climax of the concert. Marc floods one of the most Nina Simone-like songs in the repertoire with Spanish-tinged melodramatic romanticism, while Antony joins in on the chorus and together they close with a bacchanal of counter-melodies and unisons. Among the three or four most emotional moments of my life as a concertgoer.

After Marc Almond's performance, a voice in the audience hums an old Soft Cell hit for a few minutes. Antony stops and waits until someone silences the "eighties fan" who thought they were at karaoke. A bit of irony wouldn't hurt to defuse the tension, though, and Antony usually knows how to dispense it at his shows: but this is London's first night, after all. "Man Is The Baby" feels even more like surrender, "You Are My Sister" holds up just as well without Boy George, and "Hope There's Someone" sends the whole theatre spinning.

A concert that was already an event before it even began. Perfect. Too perfect, in fact. There's an inconsistency between the fragile, dreaming soul, the spirit of exploration that voice expresses, and a certain reticence in the way it's delivered and in the surrounding setting, both musical and otherwise. As if there were a fear of shattering a dream, so that actions are repeated and controlled to the point of brushing up against neurosis. But this is only a minor concern, which, faced with this man's art, is in any case a small thing.

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