Moby, Roundhouse, London

Listening to Moby sometimes feels like one long cinematic experience, so atmospheric are his songs, that countless silver screen supremoes have taken his music wanderings to the ubiquitous level of electronic institution.

Touring a newly released eleventh album, a mixed capacity crowd reflects a career span that has transitioned from techno to punk-rock to richly sampled electronica, lending heavily, along the way, from a mixture of chill-out, disco and trip-hop.

In a varied set, the key elements are present; the guitars, keyboards, drums, sampling of orchestral or blues roots, and range of beats, from up-tempo through to the yearningly ambient, accompanied here by the powerful but fragile vocal stylings of Joy Malcolm.

Opening with the cathartic, timeless, piano waves of ‘God Moving Over The Face Of The Waters’, a genre-leaping set runs through the familiar rock and roll darings and disco bass line of ‘Extreme Ways’, to the slide-guitar-ridden ‘Raining Again’, whilst the sparkling, chiming beat of ‘Sevastapol’, is the highlight of a selection from the ambient, brooding new album ‘Destroyed’.

Due homage is paid, to roars of crowd approval, to the hugely successful album ‘Play’. The stuttering bass line of ‘Honey’, the tender, contented piano line of ‘Porcelain’, the acoustic violin-accompanied ‘Natural Blues’ to blues guitar and hip-hop beats of ‘Why Does My Heart’.

Confident enough, to throw in the hand clap, thumping bass piano of standout B-Side, ‘Flowers’, a Zeppelin cover, ‘Whole Lotta Love’, and the techno beat, retro-synth of must-have classic ‘Go’, Moby seems, by contrast, effusively grateful of the audience, mindful perhaps of career long criticism of a lack of depth to his music.

Leaping from the melancholic to the manic, the crowd respond most to the upbeat, and sensing their want Moby responds with an impassioned confessional soliloquy, epic finale, ‘Feeling So Real’, and a lasting sense amongst the sanguine masses that even the most public institutions enjoy nothing more than the occasional simplicity of a good old-fashioned rave.