Jens Lekman

Heaven,

London

17/10/2011

Hollow and industrial, but somehow blithely inviting, Heaven is an intriguing venue. It’s a good setting, however, for the music of a man whose audience is equally as contradictory.

To one side of us tonight there’s an e
ast London boy with tucked-in beige trousers, an attempted moustache, and coloured bangles up his arm. On the other, a mid-thirties couple with disassembled bike parts and harmonizing trainers discuss Myra Hindley with their tattooed workmate, and spend the show in their own glass-eyed world, no doubt glad to have a night away from Sky+ and Jamie Oliver books. They’re content. The whole crowd is content. Jens Lekman makes “nice” music for “nice people”; this show somehow bridging the divide between hipsters and young professionals and making it seem, for the first time perhaps, inconsequential.

Closer in feel to Paul Simon than any Vampire Weekend record, the orange stage light is just perfect, as Lekman’s music is so beautifully orange. It’s vibrant and attention grabbing, but not too dangerous or startling. The singer/songwriter is utterly charming between songs too; songs which bounce happily between a scuzzy
Crimea sound, with the furious belly of Bright Eyes, and a sense of Eels geeky tomfoolery. Mostly though, his music is a coffee shop level of sleepy, driven by sharp tunes that all sound vaguely familiar, as though you could assign each Lekman track its own vintage counterpart – ‘Put Your Arms Around Me’ for instance ripples into The Shirelles’ ‘Tonight’s The Night’ rather agreeably. 

While some tracks are a little dull for a headline show, it’s songs like ‘Opposite Of Hallelujah’ and the overall feeling of warmth, and such comprehensively spacious, well constructed melodies, which leave you with nothing but good feelings for the Swede. Well made music will always be welcome, and Jens Lekman is very, very good at making music that just about anybody can enjoy.

Alex Lee Thomson