This would be the fourth time I'd seen Elbow playing live and based on previous experiences I knew this crowd would not go home disappointed. Support was provided this time around from Canadian indie folksters, The Acorn. Their latest album, Glory Hope Mountain, was released in 2007/08 and singer, Rolf Klausener, informs us that it's "about my Mom" before adding, self-deprecatingly, "manly, huh?". The album is well worth tracking down and is available on Bella Union Records from "all good stores".

The Corn Exchange is not really a great venue if you are under 6 feet tall. Anyone short of that sort of height will be watching the back of someone else's head, haloed with swirling coloured lights, for most of the evening. The stage could do with being a few feet higher to limit this flaw .... and don't even get me started on the drinks or the out-of-the-way location of the venue. I was fairly lucky this time around and got a good position front and centre looking down a human valley, framed by giants, towards the stage. The band sauntered on with the warbling electronics of Starlings playing in the background. After a warm welcome from the Edinburgh crowd they lined up at the front and sounded the trumpets they carried with them in the first of a series of loud orchestral stabs while the lighting engineer bathed the crowd in blinding white. An arresting and attention grabbing opening. Following Starlings with The Bones of You and then Mirrorball, Elbow seemed to be flirting with the idea of playing The Seldom Seen Kid in its entirety and truly being the "album band" they have claimed to be. I don't think they would get any complaints from their audience if they had done just that, but a rousing version of Leaders of the Free World put pay to that notion.

Guy Garvey comes across as a genuinely nice chap and seemed to be in good form on the night. "It's my birthday today" he announced before quickly following that with "Nah, it's not really" and then nodding and shaking his head in succession à la Eddie Izzard's Engelbert Humperdinck died tonight ... no he didn't ... yes, he did routine. Turns out that yes, it was really Guy's 35th birthday and the lads from The Acorn brought on some cake and drinks, the audience temporarily forgotten.

Quite what it is about The Seldom Seen Kid that propelled Elbow from being a critically acclaimed but commercially under-achieving band to multi-award winning status is hard to pinpoint. There is certainly something about the album that caught the public's ear. Something about it that struck a chord in the cultural conciousness of 2008/09. They were nominated for the Mercury Music prize for their 2001 début album, Asleep In The Back, but I get the feeling that if they had won it back then, then they may not even be here now. Certainly, having been a live act for a decade before releasing that record allowed them to forge an album that was as accomplished as many band's third of fourth releases, but slowly and steadily building on that success has built a band who are comfortable in their own skin and possessing a strength of character, which many of their peers lack. They easily fulfil the hype that the success of the past year will have created in the new wave of listeners they now have.

Garvey's voice soars above the lush orchestral soundscapes created behind him and on tracks like The Loneliness of a Tower Crane Driver and Newborn he holds his audience completely rapt. The endorphine-producing, euphoria-generating, One Day Like This brings the gig to a pre-encore close and Garvey showers the audience with streamers while leading the sing-a-long "Throw those curtains wide. One day a year like this, will see me right".

Returning to the stage for the encore we're told, tongue-in-cheek, that it seemed appropriate to celebrate Guy's birthday with a song about crushing alcoholism. Thus was my favourite Elbow track introduced. Some Riot being my favourite Elbow song perhaps speaks volumes about me but the lyrics clearly have been written with complete honesty by Guy, and it shows, especially hearing him sing it live.

This band are in the form of their lives and you should grab firmly any opportunity to see and hear them play. It was a rolling sea of smiling faces that poured out of the doors once the house lights had gone up.

Setlist

Starlings
The Bones of You
Mirrorball
Leaders of the Free World
The Stops
Any Day Now
Mexican Standoff
Grounds For Divorce
The Loneliness of a Tower Crane Driver
Newborn
Switching Off
Weather To Fly
One Day Like This
encore
Some Riot
Station Approach
Scattered Black and Whites

photo of Elbow, live in Wolverhampton, by Steve Gerrard - www.stevegerrardphotography.com