Displaying a sense of timing and occasion more the mark of a seasoned actor than a rock singer, Karen O picks the moment of optimum expectancy to enter. When she does, stage left, an adoring throng whoops as one and every camera lens in the pit is turned to track garage rock's coolest new star. Yeah indeed.
Before the main event though, The Kills amplify with amphetamine-gripped style why they are fast shaping up to be darkly shining stars in their own right. Moreover, their garage blues is the perfect foil for what will follow. Taking their cues from Royal Trux, Velvet Underground and 'Dry'-era PJ Harvey, the duo deliver the lean, fag-fuelled sounds of their debut LP, 'Keep On Your Mean' side. Facing each other down onstage - Hotel chopping away at his strings, VV shrouded in smoke and stomping her feet - the pair work a sexually-charged dynamic of irresistible potency.
You couldn't say quite the same about Har Mar Superstar, whose solo, prankster-rap shtick opens the show. A (half) pint-sized Ron Jeremy look-alike who strips down to a posing pouch and trainers, he delivers tongue-in-cheek rhymes about getting jiggy wid it over dirty, DIY electro-funk. He might take a leaf from Prince's book, but Har Mar is more farce than phwoar. Strictly sect appeal only.
Far more intriguingly, as we await Karen O's irresistible entrance, it's briefly left to partners Nick Zinner (guitar) and Brian Chase (drums) to set the mood for the final date of Yeah Yeah Yeah's sold-out, UK tour. This they do by picking at the bones of 'Rich', a new tune so thrillingly skeletal you half expect a roadie to run on and administer a drip.
Not that there's anything remotely puny about the Brooklyn hipsters' sound; they keep it lean and mean, certainly, but the first four songs tonight are pulled from their debut LP, 'Fever To Tell' - released in April - and they practically come out with fists clenched. Clipped into minimal shape by Zinner's bluesy, razor-edged riffs, 'Cold Light', 'Man' and 'Date With The Night' have a staccato strut and spaciousness which sets them apart from live faves such as 'Bang' and 'Our Time'.
Togged out in a tank top with tiny matching shorts and trademark torn fishnets, Karen O projects an unstudied, drop-dead cool. She skips and wheels about the stage, twirling her mic and waggling her butt, letting loose a powerful, punky yelp and smiling all the while with sheer, unaffected pleasure at her own performance. By the time they lunge into newie 'Kiss Kiss' mid-set, Yeah Yeah Yeahs have made that crucial leap from cult hipsters to conquering heroes. All hail.
