C Duncan, Night & Day. 12th May 2022

I arrive at Night & Day tonight already knowing this is going to be great. I’ve seen C Duncan before and know I’m in safe hands. This is the music my head needs now. It’s melancholic choral lofi dreampop. Floaty stuff, wonderfully blissful floaty stuff. Chris is four albums in now, which is not only fantastic to see artists like this get support, but means that live, there’s a ton of songs to choose from. New album ‘Alluvium’ came out last week and there’s a good number of tracks from it tonight in this wonderful venue. I am a little saddened to find it’s not packed to the rafters, but having a bit of room to move does make hearing these songs live even more relaxing. They start with the gorgeous ‘Bell Toll’ with its catchy whistles which I love, but it’s the summery sounding synths of ‘Heaven’ that first make my heart swell. To be honest though, it all does. Chris’ lovely breathy vocals sound amazing. “That was class” someone shouts as they finish ‘Air’ and I couldn’t agree more. For all the drifty tempos, they’re more than capable of some real grand bombast too. ‘Other Side’ is the perfect example and ‘Like You Do’ soars too. We’re also treated to ‘For’ from debut LP Architect. It’s songs like this that got me hooked and it’s a joy to hear live. The crowd are devout, knowing every song. The girl behind me squeals with joy as Chris introduces ‘Say’ and if you’re going to have a listen to C Duncan and you should, this is a good place to start. They close with ‘Earth’ which feels fitting, allowing guitarist and salesman Andrew to solo a bit as they crank everything up. Seriously his sales patter for the merch table is on point too. It’s been years since they played Manchester. I was there at Band on the Wall. Tonight the crowd don’t want to let them go, so we drag them back for the dancey ‘Impossible’, before I go and spend some money at Andrew’s instruction. Seriously though I was going to anyway. As well as sounding great, Chris does the album art too and the vinyl releases are stunning. I head back out into the crisp Manchester night with a spring in my step, still floating.