THE PSYCHEDELIC FURS // STYLUS, LEEDS
Aged Like Fine Feedback : The Psychedelic Furs Prove Cool Never Rusts
⭐⭐⭐⭐(4/5)
THE PSYCHEDELIC FURS PERFORMING AT LEEDS’ STYLUS
PHOTOCREDIT: JOHN HAYHURST
Somewhere in the bowels of Leeds University’s Student Union, while early Halloween carnage raged upstairs — bananas, superheroes, and a coven’s worth of face paint dancing through corridors — The Psychedelic Furs turned the Stylus into a time-machine with bite.
Anja Huwe (Xmal Deutschland) set the mood like a coronation. Treated as Goth royalty in Leeds, she commanded the room with cool hauteur, sharpening the air firstly with “Boomerang” and then later “Polarlicht” before sealing the set with a prowling, powerful “Incubus Succubus.” All Xmal Deutschland classics. It was all sculpted shadow: elegant, icy, and exactly the right preface.
Then the Furs strode on and detonated the night with “Heaven.” No long fuse, no easing in — the chorus bloomed and the whole floor moved as one, a stood-up crush of 50 and 60-somethings rekindling their student youth. From there the pacing was ruthless: “President Gas,” “Wrong Train,” and a sighing, purple and silver-lit “The Ghost in You.” The deeper the set went, the noisier the devotion got — especially when “Mr. Jones” landmined the room; you could practically see people losing their minds at their own private deep-cut moment.
Front and centre, Richard Butler was all louche theatre: shades on, mic stand as foil, half drawl, half dagger. The voice? Character over polish. He drifted off-key at times, yes, but the hoarse-throated grain has aged into drama — cracked porcelain that catches the light better than something pristine. When he leaned into “The Boy That Invented Rock & Roll,” or curled around “Until She Comes,” the rasp made the romance feel bruised and grown.
On bass, Tim Butler drove the engine — calm menace and iron timing. But the coolest presence in the room was Rich Good on guitar: knife-clean lines, stylish restraint, and tone for days. He was all silhouette and signal, turning “Love My Way” into a gleam and “Heartbreak Beat” into a chrome-bright sprint.
Early doors, someone near the front yelled for “India.” Richard grinned: “Yes — we’ll get there.” Promise logged, tension set. In between, the band threaded melody and muscle — “No-One,” “In My Head,” “Run and Run” — before the communal sing-back of “Pretty in Pink” erupted like pop déjà vu. Upstairs, the student parties thumped on — apples bobbing in vodka, capes snagging on stair rails — but downstairs felt sealed off, humid with memory and present-tense electricity.
For the encore, they let the room breathe and then tightened the vice: “It Goes On,” all cool propulsion, and finally that long-promised “India.” Held to the end like a relic and unleashed like a storm, it arrived immense — bassline rolling, guitars blooming, Butler stalking and spitting syllables into a swirl of noise.
What could have been a comfy greatest-hits lap instead felt wired and awake: a band with presence, precision, and a sense of theatre, playing to a crowd old enough to know exactly why these songs matter. Imperfections? Sure. But the cracks only let more light through. In a building overrun by student fancy-dress chaos, the Furs kept it beautifully serious — elegantly decayed with a beating pulse.
REVIEW + PHOTOS BY: JOHN HAYHURST
