LIVE REVIEW: Kalandra @ The Cathouse, Glasgow

Ahead of their appearance at this year’s ArcTanGent, the festival categorised KALANDRA as ‘uncategorised’. The band’s Instagram offers ‘raw & eerie musical landscapes’. Whatever they are, they’ve drawn a strong, diverse crowd on an autumnal Glasgow evening, part of their first ever headline tour. It’s in support of A Frame Of Mind, their stunning second album that offers some hope and grown-up introspection at a time the world needs it.

But first, Italian-based LILI REFRAIN, who introduces herself with a wide grin while ritualistically jangling bells over those in the first few rows. It’s a ceremonial welcome to a 45-minute solo set that’s meticulously built with musical loops. Part way through she explains how it all works, which you suspect is to dispel any cynicism backing tracks may be involved. Pulling back the curtain makes it all the more magical, as the remarkable complexity of her compositions always coalesce into grand cathedrals of songs.

She’s surrounded on all sides by instruments – guitars to her right, a floor tom her left, keys and programming in front – like a fortress, and watching her delicately finesse each component of a track is as if they’ve let the goths take over a Boiler Room set. It’s slow and considered, she navigates the stage with deliberateness and intention, and each song is in itself an entire performance. There’s a little metal riffing to end, but this is a set remembered for REFRAIN’s spectral voice amidst wave after wave of emotionally affecting energies.

Rating: 8/10

The contrasts at the heart of KALANDRA are ramped up on stage. Some songs, like The State Of The World, during which singer Katrine Stenbekk crouches inches from the front row as if to remove the barrier between us all, are simultaneously intimate and ready for the big leagues. The Nordic pop vibe of a track like The Waiting Game is immediate, palatable across generations, yet it rubs up against a trickier prog edge elsewhere in the set, which live feels especially tight and rugged. It’s easy to see why ArcTanGent had a hard time finding them a home, and why they were last on these shores touring with LEPROUS.

But this multifaceted arsenal is also their strongest asset. The post-rock crescendo of Segla is a chance to take the band and all their majesty in, while set-closer Bardaginn is a weird, erratic banger that invites movement. Stenbekk is the through-line with her crystal clear melodies and her stage presence, limbs reacting to the music like an improvising conductor. What the band creates on stage seems to simply emerge, a flow of musicality from the ether, while assuredly presenting each song with disciplined precision.

They are road-tested, so make the leap to headliner status like it’s no big thing. There’s no dip in energy or quality, with two albums-proper of strong cuts to dip into for a 90-minute set. Speaking with us, Stenbekk talked of the band’s excitement about what’s next, before A Frame Of Mind was even out in the world. There’s a sense of that hunger for the future tonight. The band’s confidence is evident in their performance, in their songs, and the evening is like a victory lap before a promotion to bigger rooms. It’s a show worthy of one of the year’s best albums, and with more gigs like this under their belt, KALANDRA’s trajectory will only keep heading in the right direction.

Rating: 9/10

Check out our photo gallery of the night’s action in Glasgow from Duncan McCall here: 

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