With sprawling arrangements, theatrical swagger, and extraordinary musicianship, Geordie Greep held the Lodge Room transfixed during a two-hour musical odyssey.
By Griffin Topolski
Los Angeles, CA (The Hollywood Times) 10-08-2026
“Music can be so much more than learning to play the same as everybody else. It can be anything you want. With recording The New Sound, it was the first time I have had no one to answer to. Being in a band (black midi), we often have this ‘we can do everything’ feeling, but you are also kind of limited in that approach, and sometimes it’s good to do something else, to let go of things.”
— Geordie Greep
British multi-instrumentalist and former black midi frontman Geordie Greep brought his chameleonic, adventurous sound to the Lodge Room on September 28. Over roughly two hours, his six-piece ensemble stretched songs into sprawling genre-spanning excursions with remarkable finesse and discipline. The scale was titanic, and Greep’s command held it together.
Wearing shades as he divided his attention equally between the audience and his musicians, Greep projected a self-aware cool that seemed to evoke the irreverent satire that defined his solo debut, The New Sound. Greep’s band followed his every cue with steely precision, sustaining intricate arrangements as they routinely expanded into extended half-hour improvisational passages that each demanded muscle and finesse from the band in equal measure.
With keyboards, percussion, drums, bass, and rhythm guitar surrounding Greep’s lead playing, the sound was dense and maximalist. Songs shifted between swaying grooves, odd time signatures, bursts of cacophony, and moments of subdued emotion.
“The New Sound,” the title track of Greep’s 2024 debut, was especially thrilling at its heightened pace. Over and over, the band ventured far beyond the song’s original recorded form, taking extended detours before somehow returning to its central motif with tremendous fanfare. The sheer distance the musicians had traveled from the original track made each return land with revelatory force.
Greep’s theatrical, eccentric vocals and macabre lyrics added another layer of movement to the performance. His voice carried bravado and passion, while staggering technical guitar solos showcased the immense musicianship beneath the showmanship. “The Magician” was especially beautiful: its guitar passages shone and shimmered in the live arrangement, each pulse landing with near-anthemic force, giving the marathon set one of its most affecting stretches.
Notable was the absence of phones. For nearly the entire two-hour performance, raised phones were rarely seen, something quite uncommon at most contemporary live acts. The sheer extent to which Greep’s audience provided him with such sustained concentration was perhaps the clearest measure of the performance’s success.
At the Lodge Room, Greep gave his New Sound even more room to be extravagant. His band matched that ambition at every turn, sustaining a musical journey with astonishing discipline. It was a performance more than worth following to its furthest extremes—and the audience did.
