Concerts

SXSW Review: Clock Opera, March 16, Parish

Posted on March 20, 2012 by Ricky in South By Southwest | Leave a comment

Among the unknown bands I saw last year, England’s Clock Opera was the band that impressed me the most. Their soaring melodic take on electronic music captured my imagination and I’ve been keeping track of this four piece band since.

Fast foreword to this year and Clock Opera has finally completed their debut album and it’s scheduled to arrive in April. With that in mind, Clock Opera blitzed SXSW this year with a series of performances. I caught their showcase at the Parish on Friday night.

The forty minute set proved what I suspected – Clock Opera is good and ready to roll. Their synth driven sound is augmented nicely by singer Guy Connelly’s voice, which in its most tender moments, reminds me of Guy Harveys voice. The band’s flair for the dramatics in all their tracks in my mind, separates them from similar sounding bands. I’ve already mentioned my love for Once and For All , but also tracks like Lesson Number 7 and Belongings are driving examples of the epic type of music Clock Opera is capable of and they sounded great live, much to the delight of the packed crowd at the Parish.

I fully expect this band to take off when their debut album drops in April, check them out if you have the chance.

SXSW Review: The Heavy, March 17, Stage on Sixth

Posted on March 20, 2012 by Ricky in South By Southwest | 2 Comments

The Heavy became notorious a few years ago when they astounded the audience at the David Letterman show with an incredible rendition of their hit single “How You Like Me Now”. According to the PR emails I recieved, it was one of the few times in which Letterman asked a band to play again after their initial performance. It was primarily this reason why I was able to drag myself to the Stage on Sixth for their 1 am performance on Saturday at SXSW.

I was sober, my legs and back hurt and extremely tired from a week of SXSWing.

It was irrelevant.

The Heavy were amazing.

Lionel Ritchie and Jesus & Mary Chain aside, they easily put on my favorite show of SXSW.

Lead singer Kelvin Swaby’s charisma and showmanship is off the charts. Clearly coming from a soul revival/gospel background, Kelvin Swaby sings, preaches, engages the audiences and even sings directly into people’s faces. That’s right, throughout the show, he would pick out random people in the crowd, look them dead in the eye, put his face about five inches away from theirs and sings. Talk about a personal experience. There’s something to be said about a frontman who can engage the audience in a rousing call and response session for a completely new song that no one has heard before. That happened last night.

The Heavy’s blend of soul meets hard rock is one that I haven’t seen much, but the band makes it work. It’s riveting, energetic and definitely one that can garner a lot of attention, which is why I’m quite perplexed a band with such an amazing live show is still mostly obscure. This performance at SXSW might end that, be sure to check them out soon.

SXSW Review: The Arkells, March 15, Belmont

Posted on March 19, 2012 by Ricky in South By Southwest | Leave a comment

The Arkells are pretty big in Canada. I know this because they recently played the Sound Academy, which must be some sort of beacon that signifies they have made it. I have never really examined them because of their crappy band name. It’s a stupid reason, but I also judge a book by its thickness so I’m probably a dumb ass to some extent. Either way, as part of my #occupybelmont night at SXSW, I was able to see and hear these Hamilton upstarts for the first time.

While I found Arkell’s brand of gang chorus meets middle class story telling aggro rock isn’t my type of music, I can see how they appeal to the masses. First off, they have all the moves of a good live band. The three guitarists attack the stage with relentless aggression, taking turns going from the back of the stage to the front of the crowd either with their voices or their guitars. The timing of these surges was quite impressive as well, making it like they are doing synchronized moves. They also play with nice swagger and confidence. They EXPECT the audience to answer to their calls, and expect them to sing along. It exudes a certain amount of cool. I can definitely see this appealing to a certain demographic of people, most likely they drink 50s and have tattoos and a backwards hat.

The Arkells also seem to be dabbling in the Titus Andronicus/Hold Steady vibe, where lead singer Max Kerman almost preaches some middle class spewings over aggressive rock. He’s pretty good at it, but I’m not quite sure the message is quite there. Maybe I don’t identify with sayings like punch it out punch it in. The band seemed quite eager to let the crowd know they are from Hamilton as they mentioned it several times. Not quite sure if most people in the crowd know where that is, but it was kind of endearing.

I can see why the band has become popular in such a short period of time. Their honest to good blue collar rock doesn’t really come up too often in the hipper than thou Canadian indie scene so there’s definitely a market for it. I like my music to be a little more melodic (with a synthesizer, perhaps) but I did appreciate their cover of Spoon’s The Way We Get By

The Arkell’s Michigan Left is out in the states on April 10th.

« Previous   1 2 ... 323 324 325 326 327 328 329 330 331 332 ... 508 509   Next »