Gig Review: Stereolab – The Ritz Manchester – Thursday 11 December 2025
Words and Photos: RBY
You run and you run to catch up with the sun but its sinking and you run and you run to catch the gig but you’ve spent too much time in the bar round the corner to catch the support act. You arrive shambolically into a packed Ritz venue in Manchester and realise that there’s no way with you little camera that you can get near the front to take decent photos but as Stereolab take the stage you don’t care and that it perhaps doesn’t matter (disclaimer – these are all excuses so sorry) but you are here for Stereolab and as the plunge into their dark disco and light but heavy sounds it doesn’t matter. As ever the light touch they display takes mere minutes before you are in there, in the moment and enjoying every second of it.
The band oscillate from almost barber shop quartet vocals melodies to funky but not funky rhythms, from moments of sheer pop joy to extended Doors like instrumentals hitting up sounds that would be familiar to music lovers steeped in psych sounds from Hawkwind to Verstärker. Noise generators and keyboards woosh creating and alien backdrop to repetitive rhythms and the rather beautiful vocal soundscape. Its all how not top do a review but it doesn’t matter as my head is spinning with the out of kilter rhythms that blend seamlessly with the jazzy/poppy/lovely melodies. From Mystical Plosives as the set opener through a mesmerising If You Remember I forgot How To Dream Parts 1 and 2 and ending with a glorious Cybele’s Reverie Stereolab mix in a huge amount of creativity and musical changes whilst still sounding distinctly like themselves. And breathe.
Links:
Stereolab
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/stereolabgroop
Web: https://stereolab.co.uk
Shop: https://duophonic.ochre.store/