The Coral performing their Move Through The Dawn Tour at The O2 Institute Birmingham on Friday 5th October.
Review by Kevin Cooper
With all the finesse of seasoned rock stars, The Coral played to a sea of undoubtedly loyal, long time fans at Birmingham’s O2 Institute last night. And with no fancy light shows, no over the top decor, just monolithic letters spelling out their name on the back wall, they started off with Sweet Release from their latest album Move Through The Dawn.
The five piece band from Liverpool were met with roars of approval from the crowd as they settled in to deliver Chasing The Tail Of A Dream and Something Inside Of Me before taking it back for the long time fan favourites such as Secret Kiss, the melodic Pass It On and Jacqueline which brought the first karaoke moment of the evening.
Brilliant rock track Holy Revelation saw an effortlessly executed guitar solo from lead guitarist Paul Molloy which was set against James Skelley’s familiar and unwavering vocals. They delivered a spot on cover of the beloved 1960’s classic Heart Full Of Soul by The Yardbirds before the huge guitar intro to Stormbreaker had the crowd going wild, finishing their main set with Rebecca You.
The guitar riffs that made up encore song Goodbye were thrilling before they finished with the eternally popular hit Dreaming Of You.
The Coral had delivered a set which was undoubtedly appreciated by this audience. It is unfortunate that they are excruciatingly underrated because this is a talented collective who is worthy of their sturdy devoted fan base. They are a no fuss, straight to the music type of band that did exactly what they came to do, and last night the crowd absolutely loved it.