festnoise | Music & Festivals

Dec 5

Dec 5 White Lies @ Tempodrom in Berlin

2019 marks the tenth anniversary of To Lose My Life, that magnificent album of White Lies that kick-started their music career. And to celebrate it the band is nowadays embarked on a European tour where they are playing the album in its entirely. Last Tuesday December 3rd, they stopped in Berlin to play at Tempodrom.

But the West-London trio also released back in February “Five”, their latest studio album that marks a decade of their existence whilst cementing their new home at (PIAS) Recordings. The landscape has drastically changed over the past decade, contemporaries have come and gone, consumerism constantly evolving but White Lies fans have remained as fervent and committed as ever both in the UK and internationally. Click here to listen to Hurt My Heart, their first single extracted from “Five”.

As they explain: “This is a milestone record for White Lies. It marks our decade as a band, which has pushed us to expand our sound and reach new territory artistically, it marks the start of a new and exciting chapter for us.”

Back to the Berlin concert, I must say that I have mixed emotions with this band. They undoubtedly have great hymns and a respectable and prolific career. I definitely like them and I've seen them several times before both in festivals and solo gigs but, somehow I have the feeling that they never really end up connecting with the audience. At least not fully. There is always something that I miss on them. This tour is a good example of it. A great debut album that they now play entirely but have never really stopped paying tribute, making them selling a lot of tickets and doing festivals around the world but whose name has always been surpassed in the posters by others. A terrific band that has never headlined a major festival. White Lies always seems to lack something.

They brought to Berlin a simple, but good and effective staging, with a powerful lights setting that acts as an extra member of the band. Something relevant considering that the British trio is not very active - or very talkative - on stage.

In any case, if you have the chance to see them, don't miss it, it's a good show to attend. And it is always delightful to enjoy in their live version those wonderful songs of To Lose My Life, combined this time with the songs of a new album for which they have returned to the producer Ed Buller, who seems to know how to get the best out of this band. And the new songs sound really good, they´re being well accepted by the audience. Something that you can tell by feeling the enthusiasm when they play Tokyo, Time To Give or Hurt my Heart.

Check below some pictures of their Berlin show at Tempodrom!