CLEOPATRICK at Electric Brixton: Riffs, Rapture, and the Tallest Bastards in South London

Image source: The Upcoming | Copyright: © Virginie VICHE

Reviewed by your resident short-arsed corporate metalhead.

Saturday night. Left home reeling from the most exciting part of my week, a client deck titled “Future-Proofing Our Go-To-Market Strategy” (seriously, what is with the corporate jargon? such an ick) then legged it down to Brixton – significantly better looking than I would have been coming from the office. Small wins.

I was pumped. CLEOPATRICK – Canada’s finest purveyors of shouty slacker blues – live at Electric Brixton. I was ready. Unfortunately, so were 1,400 other people. In a venue that felt like it had been designed by someone who’s never stood behind a 6’5” man with a vape the size of a Pringles tube.

Glorious. Loud. Sweaty.

CLEOPATRICK absolutely brought it. Two lads, one guitar, one drum kit, and a metric tonne of angst delivered with the sex appeal of a collapsing shed (in the best possible way). They ripped through bangers like:

• “Hometown” – a.k.a. the national anthem of anyone who grew up in a town with more cows than feelings.
• “Family Van” – which made me want to road trip through a thunderstorm with tears in my eyes and snacks in the glove box.
• “OK”, “Youth”, and “Good Grief” – all sounding like Nirvana if they worked in a Canadian tire shop and had therapy once.

There’s something about their raw, fuzzy energy that just gets you in the ribcage.

The Venue: Poo Poo

Electric Brixton, let’s chat.

I love you in theory – cool lighting, decent sound, enough sticky floor to feel like a real gig. But good grief, what happened to capacity limits? I’ve seen fewer people at a Heathrow passport queue in July.

It was oversold to hell and back. I moved approximately 8 inches the entire night and had the honour of watching the whole gig from between two giraffe-shaped lads in vintage Strokes tees (as the world’s biggest Julian Casablancas fangirl, I’m not complaining about the clobber). I’m not even that short, and I saw nothing but backs, elbows, and the occasional flash of stage light like God teasing me with hope.

At one point someone turned to me and said, “Do you want to get on my shoulders?” and I thought, Darling, I work in marketing. My dignity’s already fragile. So no thank you, but also…yes please.

Also – can we talk about the heat? I’ve been in saunas with more ventilation. It was so humid I think I saw a cloud form near the merch stand. It smelled like beer, regret, and deodorant failure. Sexy.

The Vibe: Rage. Sweat. Shared Trauma.

The crowd, though? Beautiful. Sweaty. Committed. The pit was full of flailing limbs, bad haircuts, and people who meant it. Every time a bassline dropped, the room shook like the collective weight of student loans and heartbreak had been weaponised.

At one point, the whole venue screamed “fuck you” during Family Van, and I swear I felt emotionally healed.

Summary for the Busy Corporate Girlie:

• Band: Excellent. Loud. Cathartic. Would let them ruin my life (again).
• Venue: A sauna inside a sardine tin designed for tall men with zero spatial awareness.
• Experience: 8.5/10, docked points for seeing more armpits than the actual band.
• Recovery: Two ibuprofen, one Berocca, and a stern note to Electric Brixton’s capacity planner.