Pelican, Circa Survive, Thrice show

Thrice and Circa Survive and Pelican

So, I went to a show at Northern Lights last night with my friend Tom to see Pelican, Circa Survive, and Thrice. I realized I have been really lacking in posts, and it's only been like three days on vacation, so I reviewed the show.

Monday's show started out with some gruff staff members taking tickets, demanding to see some IDs, and then some unhappy-looking fellows handing out fliers for show venues. It wasn't a very welcoming entrance to my first show at Northern Lights, but I wasn't expecting one.

Scene kids were stationed all around the stage, where Pelican would begin at 7. Pelican started in with a deep, droning, and dense song, and both the bass and the kickdrum hit people hard - I mean, I could feel it in every inch of my body, and it made my clothing vibrate on me. Pelican's songs are longer than both Circa Survive and Thrice's, and so Pelican only ended up playing 5 songs in an approximate 40 minute set. While there were a few people bobbing their heads to the beat, and a dude next to me drinking a beer and flailing anxiously to each song, the majority of people present were either too transfixed to get into the music physically, or they weren't digging it and were just waiting for Circa Survive to start up. Either way, Pelican went way underappreciated for their songs, and I had to stop and wonder if much of the audience there even knew who Pelican was. I heard talk of "They need a vocalist," which totally takes away from their songwriting. Pelican's rendition of "Last Day of Winter" was ridiculously spectacular, especially the climax which just took me by the shirt collar and didn't let go until the end. Each band member had tons of energy, and the crowd really seemed to get into it when the guitarist pulled out the violin bow to play on guitar.

Circa Survive came out and did what you'd expect - a pretty equal amount of songs from both Juturna and On Letting Go. The kids went nuts, in a very bad way. A bunch seemed drunk; all the girls went crazy when Anthony Green came out, swooning and crying for him. Girls were crowdsurfing up to the stage, reaching out to Green while he sang in his high-pitched scream. The band sounded great, each song sounding even better live than they do on the high-production albums. A mosh pit eventually started, only to be stopped quite quickly (probably because people realized how dumb it was to be moshing to Circa Survive), but I have to say that Green put on a frenetic, if not a little monkey-like, show, and it really got the audience pumped for Thrice's set.

Thrice came out with some pounding songs before jumping into songs from The Alchemy Index. The lights were set up to portray the color of each element (ie. Fire songs were red, Water songs were blue, etc.). Thrice dipped into older songs a lot, and played a minimal amount from Alchemy. Air was probably the most left out of the set (which was disappointing since I really wanted to hear "A Song for Milly Michaelson"), but their cover of Frodus' "The Earth Isn't Humming" was dead-on, especially the middle "breakdown," and "The Messenger" really carried the audience into a frenzy, especially the end, which garnered chants of "Here I am, send me!" Despite some fans causing problems, and too many chants of "DEADBOLT!" which they did end up playing, Thrice seemed to be having a good time, and after the "end" of their set, they came back out to play two closing songs after fans yelled "One more song!"

The majority of the show was high-energy candy for the audience, and though a tad weighed down by the scene-y 16 and 17 year-olds and a few drunk people, the show was a great time that mimicked how good these bands sound on record.