Photos and review by Jennie Book
@jenniebookphotography

Manchester’s golden sons elbow came to The Wiltern on October 16 with their USA & Canada 2025 tour, and sold it out for the last night of the 16-show run.

This show review will not be unbiased, because this reviewer thinks Guy Garvey should be appointed poet laureate of the world. The sheer majesty of the lyrics in any elbow track is unrivaled by any modern writer– take the night’s opening song, “Things I’ve Been Telling Myself For Years.” Read these lyrics, and then put them together with the music from a band with 35 years of expert musicianship and you have a wholly unrivaled situation, which is just how the Wiltern’s crowd reacted, with sheer love and enthusiasm, during the band’s 18 song set.

Garvey is a chatty fellow, and told stories between songs, but it usually came back to the topic of love in one form or another. Before “Balu” he said the song was about an old friend who’d call on the phone but whose call you shouldn’t answer because four days later you’d wind up “in a skip. Or a dumpster, as you call it here.”

He encouraged the crowd to sing– “sing along if you know the words”– and blew a kiss to the crowd as he sang “Mirrorball.” He talked about drinking and smoking against a bin during Covid, waiting for missives from the boys, which took me back to the band playing for all of us online during that time, all bandmates each in a square on a screen, performing solo from their homes over zoom for us, together. Garvey talked about their deceased friend Bryan Glancy who was so meaningful to them, who they write songs about, and he wondered what his wife would think of Bryan and what Bryan would think of his wife, and said she likes a rogue and he liked a princess, and they were both party animals. He said just when they think they’ve stopped writing songs about him another one emerges, and that they aren’t done writing songs about him after 20 years. This took them into “Seldom Seen Kid.”

“Lippy Kids” became an epic singalong with the crowd, as did “Grounds For Divorce,” which ended the pre-encore part of the night. Garvey thanked his crew profusely, a classy move, as sixteen dates across North American away from home and family is no small thing for behind the scenes folks making the magic come to life on the road.

Garvey mentioned crowds during the tour had been singing “We will rock you” to get the band back onstage for an encore, and the Wiltern crowd delivered, with Garvey saying “That was epic” as they came back to sing more. He said, “Thank you so much for this evening. This is dedicated to you, Los Angeles.” The crowd felt the same way as “One Day Like This” and a massive singalong ended the night– thank you so much for this evening, elbow.

This tour has ended, but for all the latest information and for future events check out www.elbow.co.uk