09/23/05
M83/Mates of State/The Double
I got to the venue a bit before the doors opened, and there was already a long line to get in. I was towards the middle of the line and all of a sudden a second door opens and a guy takes my ticket and lets me in. First in the venue. Word up.
The Double. God damn these guys blew some smelly ass. Here's my summary of how The Double came to be:
Guy 1: Hey guys, check this shit out. If you combine these two pedals at the same time I don't even have to play the guitar to get weird noises out of it!
Guy 2: That's fucking nice, man. Check this out, you know how I can't sing worth shit, right?
Guy 1: Yeah, bro.
Guy 2: Well check this shit out. *turns on echo mic* Now I sound like Paul Banks at the bottom of a well.
Guy 1: Whoa! That rules. Hey man we need a drummer. My cousin's a bit "special" in the head, but he can hit shit pretty hard. He'll do the job.
Guy 2: Word. All we need now is a keyboardist. The guy at the guitar shop is always fucking around with these keyboards that are so fucking loud that they make you wanna cry. He'll do well.
Guy 1: Sounds like we have a fucking band.
Guy 2: I love sucking dick.
So yeah. The Double blows.
If there was one thing that was prevalent throughout the Mates of States' set, it was this; they're adorable. Kori Gardner's organ playing could bring upon peace on Earth. Jason Hammel's banter in between songs was funny and kept the mood light and fun. Together they blasted through old and new songs alike. According to them their new album should be out by the Spring. For only having two people on stage they brought some serious noise and energy. I'm suprised they played such a great set of music even after they had played a set earlier that day at the festival. Fans sang along and danced to pretty much every song. It was a sweaty mess of joy and jubilation.
Last came M83. I was curious to see how they were going to play their music using live instruments. Gonzales and co stepped on stage to intro of "Moonchild", and then they broke into "*". The live instruments only added more volume and power to the already lush sounds of the songs. Gonzales kept switching back and forth from his keyboard to his guitar for different songs. The setlist covered all of their releases. With highlights like, "Run Into Flowers", "America", "Gone", "Teen Angst", "Car Chase Terror" and an incredible rendition of "Don't Save Us from the Flames". They played for nearly an hour took an exit and came back to do a nearly ten minute version of "Lower Your Eyelids to Die With the Sun". Gonzales thanked the crowd for coming out and they made their way out. I stuck around for a bit and had a couple of my CD covers signed by Gonzales and talked to him for a while. All in all, it was a great night.
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09/24/05
Built to Spill/Decemberists/Sons and Daughters
This was my first time seeing a show at this particular venue. It holds about 1200 people and I was expecting some sort of barrier separating the crowd from the stage, but it there was none to be found. Since me and my friend got there a bit early we secured our spots leaning on the stage.
Sons and Daughters were already on stage setting up the last of their instruments. They checked a couple of guitars and their mandolin and they went off stage only to return and make a proper entrance not five minutes later. They played songs from both the Love the Cup EP and The Repulsion Box. "Johnny Cash" was a crowd favorite, along with a lot of their newer songs which had a few people flailing their arms. This was the start of what would be a very familiar trend with every band: everyone loves Lone Star Beer. Sons and Daughters played for about a over half an hour and they made their exits to much applause.
Next up were The Decemberists. If this band does one thing incredibly well, it's their theatrics. With the lights dimmed to a low, dark purple, and the only sound over the PA a long drone of electronic fuzz, each band member approached the stage. Chris Funk lead the group while playing a small gong in hand. The rest of the band took their respective places, with Jenny Conlee on accordion and Nate on upright bass they started their set with "Shanty for the Arethusa". What followed was a mix of mostly older songs with some Picaresque favorites thrown in. After "Shanty.." was done, Colin started his signature banter and asked the crowd to show some collective love and cheer. To jumpstart the lovefest he grabbed his guitar and led the crowd on a miniature Decemberists version of Oasis' "Champagne Supernova". This will undoubtedly be the only time it'll be cool to sing an Oasis song in public. Virtually everyone in the crowd knew ever word, which I'm sure terrified as much as it pleased Colin. Audience participation was the center of almost every song played. For "The Legionnaire's Lament", Chris Funk and Ezra Holbrook fled from the stage and ran straight first into the center of the audience holding over sized drums and wearing long black wizard-like beards. From where I was standing I couldn't see much of what was going on, but I'm pretty sure those drums were getting beat by everyone around them. Towards the end "A Cautionary Song", Meloy and Funk started an entertaining guitar duel which had both members leaning into the crowd and having random people play their guitars so that the other would do the same. The real highlight of the set came for the closer "The Chimbley Sweep". While starting the song regularly enough, Meloy then kept slowing the song down to snail's pace, and then dropped to his knees and pleaded with the audience to do the same. One by one (myself included) each person kneeld or sat down on the floor to the slow strum of guitars and faint violin melodies. Seeing a room of over a thousand people drop to the floor in unison and then have them all jump back up for the climactic close was worth the admission alone. The applause was tremedous, and with that the band took their leave.
After over 20 minutes of setting up their equipment, Built to Spill were ready to jam the hell out of everyone, and by that I mean they permanently damaged my hearing. The first couple of songs were good, but were plagued with bad sound levels. After some much needed tweaking, the band found their rythm and blew through over an hour of old and soon to be favorites. "Distopian Dream Girl", Center of the Universe", "Kicked It In the Sun" were all immediate crowd pleasers. Songs from their new album all sounded great and had a great rock feel to them. Doug didn't say much before or after each song, but what he lacked in speech he certainly made up for in his songs. After over an hour of deafening music, Doug said goodbye and left the stage along with the rest of the band. After a couple of minutes, everyone came back to play one more song. Just a few notes in and everyone knew what song it was, the band played a cover of "While My Guitar Gently Weeps". It's safe to say that pretty much every single person went completely ape shit crazy. After the song was done, the band said their final goodbyes and left the stage. Fin.
I know for a fact that out of every ACL after show, this was the one that everyone was most excited for, and for good reason. Three sets of music, and a seemingly perpetual ringing in my ear later, the night was over, and finding myself one setlist richer, I left the venue with a smile on my face that I still can't get rid of.
