LIVE REVIEW: Madness, The Lightning Seeds, OVO Hydro, Glasgow, 01/12/2023

The very cold night in Glasgow wasn’t enough to stop the stampede of Madness fans heading to the Hydro as the C’est La Vie tour rolled into town. Fans would want to help the band celebrate their new number one album Theatre of the Absurd Presents: C’est La Vie, which was their third time topping the album charts but their first studio album. Tonight we would get to hear tracks from the new album as well as songs from a bygone era.

The Lightning Seeds were a good choice of support for this arena tour with the Liverpudlian band entertaining those that turned up early with a set of songs from the past as well as a few from their 2022 album release See You In The Stars, this being their first album release for thirteen years. Ian Broudie still has the excellent vocals and sounds just the same as he did in the 1990s as he worked his way through a setlist packed with hits including Marvellous, Sugar Coated Iceberg, Change and Lucky You. Emily Smiles is a track from the new album which was co-written by Terry Hall; The Specials’ frontman that passed away recently, with Broudie commenting that he was really lucky to get to work with such a legend. By the end of the set there must have been around eight thousand in the arena as the band finished with big hitters The Life Of Riley and Pure. The Lightning Seeds will be touring with Madness again next year as well as having their own headline tour at the end of 2024. 9/10

There was a real buzz of excitement around the Hydro as a DJ played on the stage with the standing area completely packed out. The Madness line up hasn’t changed at all since they formed in 1978, the only exception being that Chas Smash (Carl Smyth) left the band a few years ago so they are now down to six members, those being Suggs (Graham McPherson) on vocals, Chrissy Boy (Chris Foreman) on guitar, Bedders (Mark Bedford) on bass, Thommo (Lee Thompson) on sax, Barso (Mike Barson) on keyboards and Woody (Daniel Woodgate) on drums. The set opened with Theatre of the Absurd from C’est La Vie then they went back to where it all started with Suggs singing “Buster he sold the heat/With a rocksteady beat” as the crowd has a first chance to dance to The Prince, a cover of an old Prince Buster track. The arena exploded into two minutes of smiles and dancing and got everyone warmed up for the remainder of the twenty four song set. The set would move quickly from C’est La Vie to a big hit, then back again keeping the fans onside, as this would be the first time hearing the new songs. From Thompson’s opening note on saxophone it was time for My Girl, one of their most popular tracks from 1979’s One Step Beyond album as excitement reached fever pitch. The Ska music that Madness play is timeless with young and old joining together to create a special bond with loads of families attending and dad dancing breaking out throughout the arena!

Pork pie hats and Fez’s were the choice of headwear for a lot of the fans tonight and it was good to people watch during the interval as the arena filled up, proving anything goes at a Madness concert. Eight songs from C’est La Vie were played alongside the bands massive tracks including Embarrassment, Grey Day, Shut Up and One Step Beyond to name just a few. The standout track from the latest album had to be Run For Your Life, which tries to humorously tackle the goings on in the modern world. A nod to fellow Ska band The Specials was played during the encore when Friday Night, Saturday Morning was covered in tribute to Terry Hall, the two bands always being good friends. Another Prince Buster cover, Madness, gave the crowd one last chance to give the last of their energy before the usual last song at their live shows: Night Boat To Cairo, which went down well with the Glasgow crowd as they said goodnight to another year with Madness. The UK tour continues and we can expect to see Madness performing next summer in Edinburgh and elsewhere. 10/10

Written By: Alan Brown