Let This Colony Know

I’ve been waiting for this night for awhile and even longer to see this band who I’ve enjoyed for so long. The opening band Twin Tigers played a pretty nice set and their sound fit well to open for Interpol. But I won’t discuss much on them. They weren’t bad at all but they weren’t amazing.

The moment finally came for Interpol to hit the stage. Opening with a new song from their up-coming album showed just how much you didn’t even need to have ever listened to a song by them to tell its they’re good at what they do. They followed the new with an old classic, Evil. As soon as the bass kicked in everyone knew to follow with, “Rosemary!”. It was amazing and the crowd was a good one to be a part of.

They continued sprinkle in a couple new songs here and there but the majority of their set was the good oldies everyone loves. With songs like PDA, NYC, and Narc in the set, anyone who knows Interpol knows that’s a set worth going to see.

Their encore was intense starting out with Leif Erickson and following with Stella Was A Diver And She Was Always Down. Both of which blew my mind at how good these guys are at putting on a show and playing great music. Last but certainly not least, my personal favorite, Obstacle 1 was their closer. The fast upbeat tempo and everyone screaming, “She can read! She can read!” was so intense. This was definitely a show to go see and if you missed out then you should regret it. But on a lighter note the boys in Interpol will be back soon after the release of their new album next month. 

-Trey

Thanks to my friend Alex, who came through with a free show ticket, I went to a show last night not knowing any of the bands playing.  There was something about the spontaneity of it all, and that it was free, that let me keep an open mind to the music. However, it was apparent that none of these bands should be together in the same venue.

To use a metaphor, this show was like an open invitation house party.  The openers Bear Crossing were like the creepers that you don’t want in your house in the first place, who don’t really belong there and just want to pound beers as they pound their fists in the air.  Their style is like a hard rock Muse — not entirely mindless, but completely devoid of anything really technical or ear-catching.  Their stage presence was pretty lame too:  80’s rock star theatrics such as the frontman lifting his guitar up while he “shredded” just came off as cheesy, his jokes weren’t funny, and every now and again he’d hold a hand to his ear, as if he was expecting any member of the audience to know the lyrics.  That being said, they’re a local band with time to develop and aside from their goofy stage antics, they were pretty tolerable.

Gamble House were like the people that show up from another school that you don’t really know except through a few mutual friends.  As mentioned on this blog before, their Grizzly Bear by-way-of-LA sound was awesome to hear live.  At this early in their career though, it’s obvious that they are far from great.  For starters, for most of their set the songs were aimless—everything sounded nice, but everything was messy and nothing ever stuck with you.  At any random corner they’d throw in some Grizzly Bear style “oh ohs” but they just felt like they stuck them in the song for the fuck of it.  It wasn’t until around the end of the set that they played their best material that really made you groove.  It would be awesome to see them step out of Grizzly Bear’s shadow and stand on their own two as a great band.

Rogue Wave were the veteran partiers, the “old heads.”  Apparently they’ve been around for about 6 years and have a handful of albums under their belts.  They’ve got a tight live sound and played a pretty lengthy set.  But it’s probably worth saying that there’s a reason that tickets to their show was given away for free by The Norva. To be honest I have never had the desire to check them out and for being in the indie game for so long, they should be way bigger than they are.

At the end of the day though, I’m glad I went to the show, if only to see Gamble House and to see what the big deal was about Rogue Wave.

- Ryan

It was a slow night to begin with a long wait until the eight o’ clock launch for the first performer, Hesta Prynn. The sexy New York image she gave made me believe that this could be great. That was hardly the case. The tone def, “Oh Oh Oh!” lines of every single song she performed followed by vogue dance routines, a terrible rap chorus in a song, and yelling “Norfuck” as our city’s name was quite annoying to say the least. I was sitting at a table downstairs while she performed which tells you how exciting the performance was. 

After Hesta Prynn’s set it was time for the moment everyone had been waiting for, Tegan and Sara. With hardly any wait to set up, the ladies came out to an old school funkadelic track and started things off with a new song from their album Sainthood. They followed the rest of the beginning of their set with all new songs such as On Directing, Red Belt, Alligator, and The Cure, just to name a few, which was a great way to do things. Playing all new songs in the beginning led to all of the great old and classic songs that everyone knows and loves. Tegan ended up telling the crowd she has been in a older song mood lately which definitely made the show that much better to know the dedication to the fans.

When the older songs kicked off there wasn’t a watered down moment. Every song hit hard and sounded amazing. The ladies are truly great performers. Playing, Walking With A Ghost, I Bet It Stung, Nineteen, and The Con alone was enough to end my night satisfied but that wasn’t the only things the ladies had for fans. 

The encore was amazing. Starting off without the band they played Dark Come Soon. Slowly destroying the vocals with their perfect harmonies and synchronicity showed just how talented the ladies are. They followed with a stripped down version of Back In Your Head which was really neat. As Tegan only played a keyboard and Sara taking the acoustic guitar and really making it a slow, personal version of the fast and upbeat playful song it is. Call It Off followed and set everyone up for the most amazing song of the night which was a total surprise to me and I’m sure to everyone else because they probably never even heard it before, Living Room. Coming from one their oldest albums I was so excited to hear that they would end on that note. My personal favorite song as the end of the show made it a great end to a great performance.

-Trey

Can you imagine years from now children asking their parents what they listened to when they were younger and then telling those poor adolescents…

“Well son, back in my day, we used to do the Pretty Boy Swag.”

-Trey

His review for the Vans Warped Tour 2010 was fairly accurate. But I still enjoy PTV fag!

-Trey

Another year of Warped Tour at Virginia Beach Amphitheater has gone down in the books.  Let’s reflect.  Or you could skip the review and listen to Trey’s Warped Tour Playlist.

The day started off on a slightly bad note with pop-punk band Set Your Goals playing curiously early.  They have way more fame in this industry to get stuck with such an awful time slot, because true fans like me and Trey missed a quarter of their set by arriving just a few minutes late of opening time.  Hell, even Jesus came late to their set.  Still, their set was fun and set the tempo for the rest of the day with lots of crowd surfing and moshing.

Playing on the same stage directly after Set Your Goals was Parkway Drive.  Parkway Drive is an above-average metalcore band from Australia, who play songs for kids with above-average taste.  Even though they brought intensity with their stage presence and those crushing breakdowns, the set was by and large too forgettable to have an impact. 

To see metalcore done right, we went to Every Time I Die’s set taking place at the mainstage.  Every Time I Die has been around for more than a decade now, so they always manage to draw surplus crowds.  And with their lively crowd interaction and catalog of sarcastic, party-themed metalcore songs, their set is always fun for everyone.  Midway through the set, vocalist Keith Buckley suggested that someone kiss the guy holding up one of those generic “Free Kisses” sign, for example.  Every Time I Die also cater from four of their albums, making sure that every fan is pleased.  That’s something that some later-mentioned bands can definitely use help with.

Cutting out early from Every Time I Die’s set closer, we made it just in time to catch Emarosa already prepared and ready to play their first song.  If you know Emarosa, you know that Jonny Craig is a double-edged sword to the scene.  On one end, his vocal range is enough to make the best singers in the scene second guess themselves.  On the other, he’s decidedly self-aware that he’s a narcissistic dick.  Every crowd-addressing statement came with an insult: “I’d like to thank you motherfuckers for coming out,” “Do you faggots want to hear a new song?” Before ending his set, Craig demanded that some girls flash their tits, which of course, some girls who got caught up in the moment obliged to.  Still, love him or hate him, he’s got the performances to sort of justify what he’s doing.  

Next was Bring Me The Horizon, brilliantly scheduled up against the lamest but fairly notorious metalcore band Whitechapel.  Whitechapel makes music for high school kids who think it’s brutal when a band uses a logo that is hard to read.  Bring Me The Horizon, led by the iconic frontman Oliver Sykes, drew a pretty large crowd considering who they were up against.  But their current choice of setlists stack all songs from their latest album and just one old song, and never a different old song either.  It’s a pretty pretentious move from a band that may or may not be here tomorrow.  There’s no denying their talent and it’s always fun when late in the set, Oli urges the crowd to form a wall of death, where the crowd leaves a huge gap in the middle of the pit and then forcibly run into each other.

Crowd favorites and my personal highlight, Four Year Strong, was up next.  Four Year Strong is known for their catchy singalongs and intensely good vibes.  They play breakdowns but there are never any assholes trying to start fights.  Plus their catalog is so strong that from start to finish, every song is a song to get excited over.  I could have used one of their 90’s covers, but other than that, nothing to complain about.  I just loved the crowd participation, from when everyone was chanting “Wasting time, all along you were just wasting mine,” from when Four Year Strong cut out the music during “Heroes Get Remembered…” to allow the crowd to shout “Team up, team up!”  It just makes for a highly enjoyable and memorable set. 

Skipping the OG “brutal” band Suicide Silence, we waited around to get a taste of Emmure’s set.  Emmure is a metalcore band that has made the curious career move of dressing up like wiggers, making songs with little nu-metal raps in them (think Slipknot or Korn), and playing dubstep in between songs.  As a result, the crowd watching them sucked, and I do believe some guy got knocked out from some asshole who thinks moshing is just about throwing random punches. 

We stayed for 3 songs then quickly cut out to see another personal highlight of mine, Closure in Moscow.  Closure in Moscow, despite obviously taking inspration from The Mars Volta, is one of the most unique bands in the scene right now.  I bet they felt alone this year, being the only band offering super technical progressive post-hardcore music.  I had a huge gripe with vocalist Chris deCinque being strange just for the attention.  He comes out on stage wearing lipstick, eye shadow, a poncho and girls leggings….with his beard stubble.  He continues making weird faces all set and these weird mechanical movements to the time-signature shifts in the songs (but to be honest, it’s tight that he knows those shifts like the back of his hand).  This went on till the end of the set, where he acted like a malfunctioning robot, mixing up his words on purpose and then making a fake angry face when walking off the stage.  I would say they were the most talented band there, they just need to curb their self-indulgent stage presence and become a more genuine band. 

The day ended with Pierce The Veil, one of Trey’s favorite bands that I could care less about.  To me, their music is as good as a used game:  it’s not brand new, it’s been played before, but at least it still works. They incorporated not one but two covers in to their set (Drake’s “Find Your Love” and “How Low Can You Go” from Ludacris) so I’ll at least recognize that they’re willing to experiment with their set.  But I definitely took a sigh of relief when they were over.  

Closing words:  Warped Tour is fun every year but each year for me it has lost a bit of its appeal.  Next year will have to be truly amazing for me to even consider going.

So yesterday I discovered the two most amazing music websites on earth. The concept of these two sites is taking away the average stage setup and bringing a band or artist into a completely different location to play their songs. Some of which include double decker buses, the Eiffel Tower, and even a stroll around Sydney Harbor. Shoot The Player and La Blogotheque are the masterminds behind this amazing thing they call “take away shows”.

You should definitely check the sites out if you have the time.

-Trey 

“hey keep puttin this type of music up on fb, cuz of u i’ve become a fan of andrew bird and i like alot of this shit which i would have never have discovered unless u put it up here dude”

“yeah i’ve been up there a couple times i like pretty much every song! No thank you for opening up my music spectrum, i appreciate it! keep doin what u do man”

I really enjoy when people enjoy us. We appreciate you all followers or not, thanks for your support and time. - Trey