9.30.2007

Arcade Fire at Starlight Theater

It's a very tricky thing, seeing a band that you love twice in the same year. You know that they will play the same songs, leaving some of your favorites out and adding rarities that you've forgotten. The opening act will be different, but overall it will be like the sequel to your favorite movie... not as good as the original.

Regardless, Twisted Wife and I went to the Arcade Fire show at Starlight Theater. All the seats were GA, which gave us a sense of urgency to get to the venue to ensure we had a great view of the band. Anyone who knows TW, knows of the infamous Morrissey concert in Lawrence where she ordered me to buy tickets the second they went on sale because she just knew it would sell out in minutes. Of course, there were still tickets available the night of the show. Well, I got to see that lovely side of TW's personality again Friday night as we were running late to the show only to arrive with plenty of good seats still available.

The opener was LCD Soundsystem, a band I knew nothing about until Friday. They were good. The songs that weren't attempting to cash in on the neo-disco craze, a la The Killers, were amazing. The 13-25 demographic at the show seemed to love them, but if they want to get me as a fan they will stick to their more experimental songs. Another item of note about LCD Soundsystem, they were NOT good looking. This is always a plus for me because it reinforces my belief that the best musicians are not MTV-friendly. Don't get me wrong, I love watching good-looking people on TV. But MTV has single-handedly fucked up the music industry and I feel like a perv when I watch their "reality" shows that exploit teenage girls, which makes them nothing more than Girls Gone Wild light. As for LCD Soundsystem, they are worth checking out.

Arcade Fire: September 28th at Starlight Theater
Granted, I am one of the converted when it comes to Arcade Fire. So, my review will be good. If that's all you wanted to know, stop reading and go away. For the remaining three of you that care about my opinion, here goes.

TW and I flew to Chicago and had a great weekend back in May that included going to see Arcade Fire at The Chicago Theatre. When they announced that they were coming to Starlight Theater, I jumped at the chance to reminisce about my amazing vacation and see this spectacular band again. By no means did they disappoint. This show was every bit as incredible as the show I saw in Chicago... except different.

First, TW and I were joined by one of her closest friends. This isn't bad (I like TW's Twisted Friend), except that I knew going in that they would chat during the show... during songs I like... instead of the opening band... simple show etiquette, people.

Second, Starlight is outdoors. Anyone who knows anything about live music knows that most sound engineers have troubles outside. Arcade Fire's was no different. It wasn't awful and there wasn't a ton of feedback, but it was worse than Chicago.

Finally, the band opted-out of playing songs like Neon Bible and Windowsill. I can't say for sure why, but I would bet it is the conservative politics of the region that stopped Win from singing lines like, "ain't no chance for survival, if the neon Bible is true," or "I don't want to live in America no more." I hope that I'm wrong, but these songs were sorely missed from the set list.

Even though this show would not easily make my Top 3 like the show in Chicago, it would be in my Top 10. Arcade Fire is incredible live and anyone who decided to skip out on this show, and you know who you are, made a huge error in judgement and is officially on the newly adopted Twisted Jim's List of the Musically Stupid.

posted by Jim at 6:57 PM

1 Comments:

Anonymous said...

I would have to disagree with your comment on Chicago being conservative. It's the third largest city in the U.S. They would never kick songs out of the playlist over two small barely-even-controversial lines in the lyrics. This is Chicago, not Bumblewood, North Dakota. Why do people from the coasts still think the Midwest is asleep, wrapped in a comfy featherbed of Rightwing, Christian, wholesome, corn-loving naivite?

3:20 PM