Music > Live Reviews

Fredo – LCR

The Nick Rayns LCR, UEA

04/03/19

Fredo is one of a seemingly endless stream of young UK talent who appear, and have almost instant success, in his case debut track They Ain’t 100 was a huge song when it dropped in 2017. Following it up has proved surprisingly easy and with a recently released debut album hitting the top five, 2019 is going to be a big year for Fredo.
I like some of what he does, the album certainly has its moments, but I also find Fredo frustratingly one dimensional; lyrically it rarely strays far from tales of the trap life. I remind myself though that this is someone who is less than two years into the music game, and with his first album barely a month old, I wanted to see how all of this would work in the live setting, so I slipped on my Moncler sweater and headed up to the LCR with a couple of my day ones to see what was what.
The venue was rammed, filled predominantly with slightly aggressive young men, and the music was pumping. Just a DJ for support, meaning after they finished their set we got a spell where not much happened, before Fredo arrived to the expected sea of phones screens and energy. I’ve barely seen an interview with him and wasn’t sure how he would come across live, but I was instantly impressed. His voice was high in the mix, and although his raps are hardly the most challenging, he nailed them. The music was loud, and the stage was set up like the front of a building, with some of Fredo’s mandem chilling on the balcony. It felt much bigger than I’d expected, and he was much more assured and confident than I thought he would be. He also played for about 75 minutes which for someone with a relatively small amount of music was generous.
Fredo’s sound can be a bit one paced, so there were times when the energy dipped but he has enough certified bangers in the set that we were soon back up again – Survival Of The Fittest, BMT, Funky Friday (his monster smash with Dave) and especially Ay Caramba got huge responses before They Ain’t 100 was extended and rewound several times bringing the show to a triumphant close.
I alluded to the aggressive atmosphere earlier, and there were a few scuffles during the gig, and more as everyone left, with four police cars and an ambulance outside. Current uk rap, grime and drill music is by its nature aggressive music, it attracts an audience who are predominantly young and often male, but this was perhaps the first time I’ve been to a gig where I felt not entirely welcome. It’s also easy to see how in the current climate of knife violence things can quickly escalate. The fact is that this kind of music is the music of today, no new UK guitar bands are getting millions of YouTube views within days of releasing a video, and the scene is changing on an almost weekly basis. It would be a real shame if events outside of the music prevented this change from happening.
Where Fredo’s future lies is anyone’s guess, whether he can develop as an artist remains to be seen, but for the time being he’s doing just fine. With visits from AJ Tracey and Dave just around the corner, it’s an exciting time to be a fan of UK music.