This was the third and best time I've seen Chris Garneau. If my memory does not fail me, he played: Sad News, We Don't Try, Relief, Hands on the Radio, Baby's Romance, Not Nice, Blue Suede Shoes, a cover of Neil Young's Harvest, then Blackout for the encore. If anyone has a video of the Neil Young cover it would be great.
The first guy on, wow, he was awful. Terrible. Defeaningly bad. Why on earth would someone even think of booking him as the support? Shouting and swearing over a backing cd? Compared to Chris whispering lovely lyrics over the piano? Bizarre.
The first was Jack Cheshire. He wasn't awful but he wasn't very fun to watch and wasn't that great either.
Next was Greg McDonald, he was the best of the support acts in my opinion. He interacted with the crowd well and was quite cheerful.
Then was Pete Du Pon. He was pretty awful really. He played very dreary music and wasn't particularly fun to watch. He covered Green Day's Basket Case. I don't like the song to begin with, but he made it worse. He slowed it right down so we had to listen to his boring vocals whining for about 5 minutes. There were sound troubles too, the mic squeaked alot, and there was an awfully loud boom sound when he decided to unplug his guitar while it was connected to the speaker.
That was a pretty scathing review of the support acts, I feel a bit mean.
Then came Chris Garneau. He played The Island Song first. It was amazing. He sang so beautifully and it sounded fantastic. The crowd was all sitting on the floor and it was perfectly silent.
He played for just over an hour. He played quite a few songs, some I didn't recognise. He didn't play Between the Bars or We Don't Try, which I was a little disappointed by, but he played Blue Suede Shoes which I really enjoyed alot. He played Fireflies for the encore. His whole demeanor was very endearing. He seemed shy but was friendly to the crowd and sung so well. Anna Callner was great on the cello and chatted with Chris on stage, it was very sweet.
I will perhaps review in more detail later, in the meantime here are some pictures and videos:
Here is blue suede shoes:
And here is a snippet of the encore, I stopped filming to join in clapping.
I love when I'm talking to someone or theres a conversation going on and somebody says something and it reminds me of a song. It happens all the time and it usually makes me smile but nobody else ever understands because my friends don't listen to the same music as I do so they don't know the song.
A couple of examples I remember off the top of my head from last week:
1) Some people at school were messing around with some tape. Somebody asked what it said on the tape and it said "Handle with care". I said "like that Traveling Wilburys song" everyone just looked at me and said "yeeaaah" because they didn't know the song.
2) My friend was telling some story about some noise she heard and she said "it was going click click click click" and I said "like the Bishop Allen song?" and she was like "what??" and I said "haha nevermind".
I can't remember any more examples off the top of my head but this happens all the time! It happens with lyrics and albums all the time too. I like it.
Oh I just remembered another one that happens alot, when people say "Say yes!!" it reminds me of Elliott Smith.
First up was the one and only support band, Lightspeed Champion. They played well and seemed to hold most of the crowds attention for the entire set, although a few people were chatting away like fools. Dev was witty and enjoyable and had some 'special guests' amoung his band (well, I regard them to be special). He was joined by none other than Emmy the Great singing back up (whilst barefoot) and Martin (aka The Train Chronicles) on bass. There was also a drummer drumming on a tiny drum kit and a rather good violinist. They had some wierd stuffed animals sitting around the stage, Dev told us their names (not that I remember). Lightspeed Champion played for about half an hour and played 7 songs in total. I thought they were very good.
After a while changing the equiptment and putting out flowers, Bright Eyes came on. Padded out with a full string section and two drummers, the stage was pleasantly full. I was very pleased to see a band full of people who I would consider to be very special guests. There were the main 3: Conor Oberst, Nate Walcott and Mike Mogis, although some people in the audience may have been suprised to discover there are more people in Bright Eyes than just Conor. Andy LeMaster (of none other than Now It's Overhead) graced us with his presence. Rachel Bumberg (of Norfolk and Western, The Decemberists and M. Ward's band) and Janet Weiss (Sleater-Kinney and Quasi) were on drums/bongos. Anton Patzner played pashionately on the vioin.
Here you can see the string section in all its glory: A few other pictures:
Bright Eyes played alot of new songs, but threw in some old favourites, including: False Advertising, Arienette, Calendar Hung Itself, Gold Mine Gutted, I Believe in Symmetry, A song to pass the time, and the set closer- At the Bottom of Everything. They also played a sped up version of First Day of My Life which I thought was quite epic and I really enjoyed it. The projection on the screen on the back was interesting, but sometimes I found it kind of annoying because I was trying to watch the band and they all had wierd shapes all over them from the projector. They all looked very smart in their white suits, particularly Mike and Nate, but it did all seem a bit bizarre. The entire band played so well live and the sound was magnificent. Conor had such stage presence and it was practically impossible to take your eyes away from the stage. The band seemed happy to be there, Conor gracefully ignored the annoying screams of "OMG I love You Conor!!" and Mike just chuckled at them from the background. It was quite a shame Mike was so far back. It was interesting to see Conor struggle with his cufflinks for so long. Overall, I think they played superbly and I enjoyed the concert alot and most certainly got my £40's worth of ticket and travel costs. My favourite song of the night was Calendar Hung Itself. It was amazing. Here are some videos I found on youtube that some lovely person filmed and uploaded.
The Setlist: Clairaudients (Kill or Be Killed) Hot Knives False Advertising Middleman First Day of My Life Cartoon Blues If the Brakeman Turns My Way The Calendar Hung Itself No One Would Riot for Less Soul Singer in a Session Band Cleanse Song I Believe in Symetry
Encore: Gold Mine Gutted Arienette A Song to Pass the Time At the Bottom of Everything
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