It’s a Chemicals Reaction; Art Videos Timed to Music As Brothers Take Over the Square

By DAVID SMYTH

REVIEW The Chemical Brothers ****

Trafalgar Square

THE Beck’s Fusions project, which took over Trafalgar Square last night, promised to unite music with visual art.

They picked the perfect headliners in dance duo the Chemical Brothers, musicians in severe need of something large and sparkly to distract spectators from the lack of goings-on onstage.

Dressed in jeans and black T-shirts for their biggest London show ever in front of 9,000 competition winners, Tom Rowlands and Ed Simons huddled behind banks of esoteric equipment and let the huge screen behind them do the work.

Victims of the age-old problem for dance producers who want to perform live how to look busy once you’ve pressed play the non- stop synchronised videos provided more than enough diversion.

Material was specially created by Adam Smith, who has directed episodes of Channel 4′s Skins and videos for the Streets and Jamie T as Flat Nose George. United Visual Artists, creators of tour lightshows for Massive Attack and U2, took over for the hit-packed encore.

With the animations timed perfectly to the music, it was hard to work out what Rowlands and Simons were doing with all those buttons. They could have been playing Space Invaders. But no one looked too closely because of the breakdancing silhouettes, scuttling bugs and terrifying clowns on the screen.

Galvanize was accompanied by flying fists, hand grenades and fighter planes. Giant red and blue versions of guest vocalist Ali Love appeared to chant the catchy chorus of Do It Again.

The voices of last week’s Mercury winners Klaxons also rang out over urgent, psychedelic new track All Rights Reversed, while the band’s James Righton watched from the VIP balcony with Lily Allen.

Over a seamless 80 minutes, the beats built up and broke down with flawless precision. The serene beauty Star Guitar was countered with multiple moments of pure euphoria the yelp of "Here we go!" during Hey Boy Hey Girl, a beefed-up take on Primal Scream’s Don’t Fight It, Feel It, and sirens so familiar they prompted a singalong during Block

Rockin’ Beats. The sights and sounds around them ably demonstrated why, while most of their clubland peers have vanished, the Chemical Brothers are still captivating major crowds.

The only feet not moving were Nelson’s.

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