Appearance in the Admiralspalast: Kae Tempest warms the hearts of Berlin

The perceived room temperature rises by about two degrees within three minutes. This phenomenon, which is not only welcome in view of November temperatures and the energy crisis, can be experienced on Thursday evening in the Admiralspalast when Kae Tempest comes onto the stage – silent and smiling in the middle, letting the warm waves of applause roll over her.

The unseated, almost sold-out hall is filled with a warmth that is not common at pop concerts in Berlin. Tempest also thanks the audience for the welcome, the time, money and energy it took to come here.

Because Kae Tempest wants to perform the current work “The Line Is A Curve” – ​​one of the strongest since “Everybody Down” (2014) – completely and without interruptions, there is also the preliminary remark that it is an “album about bodies”. And “Bodies, mine and yours, is what tonight is all about”. We should feel them, connect them, just do what they feel like doing.

Performing the record as a whole makes sense, as it has a coherent arc-like dramaturgy and gives a sense of what Kae Tempest’s 1985 London-born body has endured – and the great liberation coming out as trans and non-binary two years ago.

“Deadset on a wish that can never exist/ A transition/ I want to be is but I’m isn’t,” Tempest raps over the synth’s rapid flicker in the song “I Saw Light,” which doesn’t have any beats, but one developed high intensity. Which also applies to the following “Nothing To Prove”. A smile crosses Tempest’s face during the chorus line.

Otherwise, Tempest smiles a lot, seems far more relaxed than in previous appearances. If the long red-blonde curls were once a kind of hiding place, the current short haircut reveals expressive facial expressions.

Dressed entirely in black, Kae Tempest uses the entire width of the stage and accompanies the lecture, which alternates between rap and spoken word passages, sometimes with sweeping, sometimes with smaller arm movements. The flow is effortless and engaging. At times, Tempest intersperses sharp accents, doubles the tempo, or spirals into loops of repetition. The audience listens spellbound and highly concentrated, there is more bobbing along than dancing, but the bodies are with themselves and the thing – just as Tempest wanted it to be.

Hinako Omeri is the only musician standing on a small pedestal in the right stage background. She operates the synthesizers and e-pianos and occasionally takes on the background vocals. Which is quite enough of an accompaniment, as Tempest’s presence is overwhelming. Only on “No Prizes” is Lianne La Havas missing, who sings the yearningly gentle refrain melody over the echoing piano chords on the album.

After half an hour the mood darkened. The tree made of ropes and threads, which towers behind Tempest and changes its appearance via projection, gives the stage something uncanny. Wafts of fog gather, the light changes from red to dark green.

In a monotonous, urgent tone, Tempest recites lines that speak of despair and pain. “There can’t be healing until it’s all broken/ Break me/ The windows are open/ The beast has awoken”. This heaviness gives way to the springy pulsation of “More Pressure”, which sets the hall in motion.

Not a peep and not a smartphone moves as Tempest recites the poem “The Woman The Boy Became” without music, which was written over eight years ago. It reports on a process of growth and change, which, starting from a “born wrong/ born strong” feeling, now seems to have developed in a more healing direction – at least that’s what the 90 minutes in the Admiralspalast suggest.

As they end, hundreds of hearts are just a tad warmer than they were when they started – and the radiance of Kae Tempest lights up the dank November night.

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