Nothing much happens at a Ladytron gig. This two boy, two girl quartet from Liverpool via Bulgaria stand stock-still behind their synthesisers, like ABBA in black polo necks after draining the medicine cabinet. This freeze-frame vision is the entire point, just like Kraftwerk's tunnel vision 'Autobahn', a perfectly realised balance of cool distance and
playfully melodic hooks.
Ladytron are the way the future was supposed to feel twenty years ago, when punk's dour domain was maintained by a new strain of electronics, its nihilistic snarl captured by a blank generation who traded in their guitars for keyboards. Like all sussed music fans, Ladytron know that New Order are
far superior to Joy Divison, that 'Low' is Bowie's best album and that pop would've been all the richer had Nico joined the Human League.
It's all muted glamour in Ladytron, all black with silver flashes, and, indeed, nothing much happens on stage. It's more of a spectacle than your average gig, a hypnotic electronic happening with the songs, eight of them in half an hour, mesmerising and spellbinding most of the audience. The three pricks in Slipknot t-shirts moshing at the front are proof that there's still a battle to be fought, but Ladytron are winning.
Ben Clancy
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