CAMBERWELL craftsman Sean O'Hagan has some very lofty ideals he wants to bring pop music to the highest peak it can possibly reach, even if that means leaving some of its baser qualities behind on the foothills. Thus, The High Llamas amply display all the heavenly possibilities inherent in rock, but hide the devilish bits underneath the harmonies and arrangements.
At the Olympia on Friday night O'Hagan brought his vision of a perfect world where Pet Sounds provides the soundtrack, and where the gentle ululations are undisturbed by the roar of wild animals (most of them stayed in the bar). Those who came to listen were well rewarded by some fine tunes bolstered with strong, unassailable arrangements when, O'Hagan writes a song, it's built to be both lasting and flexible, lending itself to all sorts of deconstruction, variation and extension while still holding its pleasant pop essence.
And The Goat Looks On, from 1993's mini masterpiece Gideon Gaye, can be viewed from any skewed angle you like, and it still emerges as a rugged but benign artefact. Campers in Control, from the recent Hawaii album, is somewhat more limited in thematic scope, but O'Hagan is smart enough not to try and turn a tent into a mansion.
The band John Bennett on guitar, Marcus Holdaway on keyboards, Jonathan Fell on bass and Rob Allum on drums already know the score, and they perform the arrangements with flowing ease, backed up by a string section.
By way of a climax, the band does the full coda for Track Goes By, even extending it beyond the end of the line. It's a somewhat satisfying end to a gig which relies more on melody than mayhem to get its message across.
