The Thermals - I Might Need You To Kill (2.22.2007)

The Thermals - Heres Your Future (live 2.22.2007)

02.22.2007 The Thermals / Romance @ The Media Club

Usually I don't go to shows on week days, mostly because I have to wake up the next morning. The Thermals/Romance show, however made it all worth it. The Thermals from Portland, OR are definitely a band with lots of media buzz. Combined this with the fact that there last album scored a 9.0 on pitchfork, I was ready for a good show. I got a great show.



The show started with the band Romance. They short of had a emo/indie/weezer sort of vibe to them. I think one of the guitarists and the keyboard player were brothers, possibly twins. By and large, the played some decent tunes. Their keyboard parts are what impressed me the most about them. This was despite the fact that it seemed like he was sloppy at times and for one song seemed to be playing an entirely different song from the rest of the group. Apparently one of their guitarists wasn't able to make it to the show so its hard to fault them too much. I'll give them credit, they were still a decent opener.



After a short break, the Thermals hit the stage with great anticipation from the almost sold out Media club crowd. They did not disappoint. For touring purposes, it looks as if they've even added a 2nd guitarist, which I suppose lightens some of singer Hutch Harris' duties, plus allows him to really throw himself into the songs. Long setlist, (20+ songs), almost gave me a heart attack thinking they would be playing way over midnight. Alas it clocked in respectably a bit over an hour (their songs are a 2-3 min long). Pretty good mix of songs throughout their 3 records. The crowd was mostly into it and then really into in about 40 minutes in when they started moshing it up to my chagrin. Basslines were tight and vocals were pretty much spot on during the night. I don't think they'll be playing at the media club the next time they're here.



$25 / $15

02.19.2007 The Shins/Viva Voce @ Commodore

Well this show kinda suprised me. I didn't think 3 albums in, the Shins would be playing that many songs off oh inverted world. Unlike a lot of bands i've seen, they seem to have forgiven me for missing the tour in which they were supporting their debut album, and actually played the majority of said aforementioned album.

Anyways onto the openers. Viva Voce is a Portland, OR based duo who play at times folky rock and the noisy rock the rest of the time. They're intro/outro song(s) contain the verse "We don't fuck around." This is true they don't. Two minutes in and we're labasted with a wall of noise coming from the guitarist's amp and we're loving it. On a couple songs the drummer trades in his skins for an acoustic guitar creating a lovely acoustic/electric guitar mix. They played 30 min, pretty good set. Definitely not what I was expecting after checking out their myspace page about 6 months ago.

The Shins were in great form today, opening with the lead off track, "Sleeping Lessons" from their new album Wincing the Night Away. You could tell they were feeding off the energy of the crowd. Even their slower numbers off their recent albums kept me interested. As mentioned before lotsa songs off of oh inverted! They played pretty much everything I was hoping they'd play. Anita Robinson from Viva Voce, sat in to do backing vocals for a bunch of songs, "New Slang" was especially moving. Natalie Portman would have been proud. They played just over an hour before closing out with "Caring is creepy." After the obligatory encore break, they came back with a Modern Lovers cover, then ending with a rocking version "So Says I" from Chutes too Narrow. I don't think i could have wanted more from this show. Definitely one of the front runners for show of the year right now.

Setlist

01.) Sleeping Lessons
02.) Australia
03.) Phantom Limb
04.) Kissing the Lipless
05.) Mine's Not a High Horse
06.) Girl Inform Me
07.) Girl On the Wing
08.) New Slang
09.) Saint Simon
10.) Girl Sailor
11.) Turn a Square
12.) Gone For Good
13.) A Comet Appears
14.) Turn on Me
15.) Know Your Onion!
16.) Pressed In a Book
17.) Caring is Creepy
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18.) Someone I Care About [Modern Lovers Cover]
19.) So Says I

$75/$46

02.16.2007 Fucked Up / The Transmitors / Riff Randles

Been a while since there was an update. Not much has been really happening since the last post. A couple of cool shows announced, plus the Police are going to start their (ridiculously overpriced) tour in Vancouver.

This show was the 2nd of a 3 show mini BC tour. IThe first being at the Croation and the last at some Surrey senior's center. This show was at Pub 340. Having previously never been to Pub 340, I really didn't know what to expect. However knowing the area, it was probably pretty skidgy. I was right. Pretty small place; capacity was about 150? Decent lighting, but pretty low stage - bad for filming as I would later find out ...ugh.

Anyways the first band to hit the stage were Vancouver's pride and joy of the punk scene: The Riff Randles. Said band, is an all girl sugar punk band. In fact, I think their drummer works at Scratch records. Not really knowing what to expect, I suppose I was pleasently suprised. Song structures of their tunes were fairly simply. Average solos and above average drumming, but all was well suited for their sound. Their new bassist was getting broken in and still seemed a bit timid on stage. Pretty good opener. Lots of kids out for the Riff Randles. Acutally, despite the fact that Pub 340 is a bar, I got the impression that this show was actually all-ages for some reason. Wait, I don't even remeber being ID'd.

Next up were the Transmitors. Didn't really impress me that much. Its not that their songs weren't catchy or good, its just that obviously fake British accents just put me off. They had a sort of Killers/new wave/Franz Ferdinand feel to them. I suppose they're good for what they are.



And finally headlining was Fucked up. Fucked Up is a band that is well known for they're crazy live shows. That is pretty much what I was banking on. I should really listen to bands before commiting to shows. sigh. Not a bad show, I mean in terms of spectacle, it was pretty wild. I mean from the first note, the pit is already started and the stage divers are already planning their jumps. Amusingly within the first 20 minutes some east coast kid got on stage stole the mic from Pink Eyes (vox) and made some sort of rant. This was met by some skidg who dumped a jug of water all over the east coaster and the stage. For me, Fucked Up was cool and all as a band, but, really doesn't do it for me musically. Beyond the crazy stage show, they're still oi punk.



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$2.5/$10

02.02.2007 The Roots

i don't care about local hip hop. so i didn't really pay attention to the openers.

The first hour of the roots' set was pure brilliance. they started out at the back of the room and marched in processeion through the crowd playing their instruments, then broke into game theory and proceeded to jam. and jam they did. some songs sounded better than they did on album, (game theory, the seed..) others like 'don't say nuthin', were kind of disappointing. just too much jamming. they played 2 and a half hours, about 2 hours longer than the last hip hop show i saw. one of the highlights of the night was their version of dylan's masters of war performed by ?uestlove and their guitarist kirk douglas. when people mention the roots, douglas is normally comes to mind after ?uestlove and black thought, but he's talented enough to form his own band. he can sing and do the guitar thing. their covers jam was also pretty cool. wu tang, james brown, JT, salt n' pepper, immigrant song and 2 unlimited were all represented. it's not that i didn't like the show or the jamming, it's just that i felt that the jamming was too much.

$100/0