June « 2010 « inTuneMusic

Bayside @ Eatontown 6/26/2010

June 26, 2010

As part of the Zumiez Couch Tour, Bayside performed a free hour-long set at the Monmouth Mall parking lot in Eatontown, New Jersey. In front of a motley crew of faux mall-punks stopping by to catch a free show and rabid Bayside fans alike, the Queens quartet played exceptionally well and likely won over many new fans while also appeasing those who already support the band.

Bayside

Bayside opened with the brief “Hello Shitty”, the first song from their 2005 self-titled album. Without wasting a second, the dark guitars of Jack O’Shea and frontman Anthony Raneri set the mood for the bleak “Tortures of the Damned”. The equally ominous “They’re Not Horses, They’re Unicorns” followed, with Raneri continuing to paint tortured images of his life and various relationships. “No One Understands” continued the band’s grim outlook, but midway through the song Raneri offered hope: “If the sun don’t shine tomorrow, we’ll survive”.

Bayside

“The Ghost of Saint Valentine”, one of the band’s standout songs from their excellent 2008 effort, Shudder, sounded great. The explosive title track from The Walking Wounded, anchored by Chris Guglielmo’s heavy percussion, found the entire crowd singing along to the song’s infectious chorus. Much of Bayside’s appeal is derived from the band’s enormous choruses, and fewer songs showcase that aspect more strongly than the tightly executed “I and I” which promptly followed “The Walking Wounded”.

Bayside

Newer favorite “Boy” and longtime favorite “Masterpiece” were terrific, but more than thirty minutes into the setlist the band’s performance was becoming extremely predictable. Bayside offered no surprises throughout their fifteen song set, sticking to the same basic setlist they established in 2008. Of the band’s thirteen songs from Shudder, just four of them received live treatment; while the band certainly picks the best songs from their older material, it would be a nice change of pace to see some of the band’s top-notch new material in a live environment.

Bayside

“Montauk” was one of the sets highlights, featuring a blistering solo by O’Shea. The band wrapped up their hour-long performance with “Devotion and Desire” as they have for much of their career; the song’s signature opening lick launched the audience into a frenzy, drawing in onlookers who had previously remained at a distance from the crowd.

Hello Shitty
Tortures of the Damned
They’re Not Horses, They’re Unicorns
No One Understands
The Ghost of Saint Valentine
The Walking Wounded
I and I
Boy
Masterpiece
Carry On
Roshambo (Rock, Paper, Scissors)
Duality
Montauk
Blame it on Bad Luck
Devotion and Desire

Bayside

Despite predictable song selection, Bayside’s performance was near-perfect during their sixty-minute set; the band put an enormous effort into each song, and Raneri pushed his voice to its limits. The band is recording a new album this fall. Judging by the merits of the band’s already-outstanding discography, the new effort is highly anticipated. Still, the band has so much material from Shudder that still hasn’t been performed live. It would be nice to see the band touch on some of their existing songs before unleashing a brand new batch.

Leave a Comment » | Bayside, Eatontown, Monmouth Mall, New Jersey | Permalink
Posted by Anthony Charles Ambrose

Thrice / Kevin Devine @ Sayreville 6/25/2010

June 25, 2010

Following an excellent performance at the sweltering hot Irving Plaza in New York City the night before, Thrice traveled south to New Jersey’s Starland Ballroom to play in a much cooler and enjoyable venue. Unfortunately, the room was barely half-full. Thrice and Kevin Devine are two of the strongest performers to roll through Sayreville this year, and it’s a shame that more people did not make it out to one of the best tours of 2010. The bands’ performances were very similar to the previous night’s Irving Plaza show, so please read that review for a much more in-depth look at this tour.

Kevin Devine and Goddamn Band

After performances by The Dig and Bad Veins, Kevin Devine and Goddamn Band began their nine-song setlist with “Brother’s Blood”. Along with “Carnival” and “Another Bag of Bones”, the Goddamn Band extended the songs to include extraneous jams and solos. The older “Cotton Crush” went fairly straightforward, as did Devine’s current single “I Could Be With Anyone”. The four-piece’s highlight came in the final song with a truly incredible cover of LCD Soundsystem’s “New York I Love You, But You’re Bringing Me Down”.

Brother’s Blood
Carnival
Another Bag of Bones
Cotton Crush
I Could Be With Anyone
Buried By the Buzz
Just Stay
She Stayed as Steam
New York, I Love You But You’re Bringing Me Down (LCD Soundsystem cover)

Thrice

Thrice kicked things off with “All the World is Mad” and “The Weight — the first two songs from Beggars — before shifting gears and tearing through the title track from their 2003 Island Records debut, The Artist in the Ambulance. Two Vheissu cuts followed: the spiraling “Of Dust and Nations” and the pulsating “The Earth Will Shake”. The Alchemy Index‘s “Firebreather” sounded great — drummer Riley Breckenridge nailed the song’s strange time signatures.

Thrice

The crowd responded well, but many fans clearly came to hear only the band’s older, metal-influenced material. Frontman Dustin Kensrue interrupted cries for “Deadbolt”, from 2002′s The Illusion of Safety (paraphrased): “Ah, the “Deadbolt” issue. We can talk about it if you want — “Deadbolt” was tired; it’s taking a nap. If you’re patient we’ll play one later from that album that has similar metal qualities.” Kensrue’s speech quieted the crowd, and, for the first time at a Thrice concert in recent memory, no one screamed for the song for the rest of the evening.

Thrice

A series of slower songs followed, including a solid rendition of the piano-led “For Miles”, which was absent the night before. “Silhouette” promptly returned the band to their heavier roots, with bassist Eddie Breckenridge’s guttural screams (“Your eyes!”) accenting the song’s already-pummeling breakdowns. Two heavy, fire-themed songs from The Alchemy Index followed (“Burn the Fleet”, “The Messenger”) before Thrice returned to their relatively softer side with the newer “Doublespeak” and “In Exile”.

Thrice

“Image of the Invisible” briefly featured spastic vocals from Kevin Devine before Kensrue thanked the crowd “for their patience”, making good on the earlier promise to play a cut from The Illusion of Safety. Thrice tore into “To Awake and Avenge the Dead”, sending the audience absolutely wild. The encore drained that energy, though, with “Stand and Feel Your Worth” just a few moments later — the track just does not work as the first song in an encore. Fortunately, Thrice concluded with a wonderful performance of “Beggars”, the title track from the band’s latest full-length.

All the World is Mad
The Weight
The Artist in the Ambulance
Of Dust and Nations
The Earth Will Shake
Firebreather
A Song for Milly Michaelson
Circles
For Miles
Silhouette
Burn the Fleet
The Messenger
Doublespeak
In Exile
Image of the Invisible
To Awake and Avenge the Dead
Stand and Feel Your Worth
Beggars

Thrice

Thrice performed a similar setlist in New York City (dropping “Hold Fast Hope” and “Come All You Weary” and replacing those cuts with “Burn the Fleet” and “For Miles”) and sounded fantastic in back-to-back nights. The band’s eighteen-song performance touched on the band’s last nine years as a band, appeasing fans of both the band’s heaviest moments as well as their softest. Few bands carry out setlist dynamics as well as Thrice; the quartet is nearly unparalleled in their live performance.

Leave a Comment » | Kevin Devine, New Jersey, Sayreville, Starland Ballroom, Thrice | Permalink
Posted by Anthony Charles Ambrose

Thrice / Kevin Devine / Bad Veins / The Dig @ NYC 6/24/10

June 24, 2010

Thrice returned to headline New York City for the first time in six years, bringing Kevin Devine, Bad Veins, and The Dig to Irving Plaza on a hot Thursday evening. Kevin Devine and The Dig embraced the chance to play in front of their hometown friends and family, while Bad Veins took the opportunity to perform in front of their biggest New York crowd to date. The mixed bill drew a varied audience, but one thing was abundantly clear: the crowd was overwhelming anxious to see Thrice, a band long overdue for a Manhattan gig.

The Dig

The Dig began at 7:30PM, supporting their latest album, Electric Toys, released earlier this month. The four-piece tightly cut through twenty minutes of indie/dancey hooks and melodies, but did little to distinguish themselves in a genre overpopulated with similar acts. Still, the band’s brief setlist sounded tight, and their crisp live performance was certainly enjoyable and refreshing for an opening band.

Bad Veins

Ohio’s Bad Veins played just after 8PM. The duo — vocalist and multi-instrumentalist Benjamin Davis and drummer Sebastien Schultz — performed well, playing a variety of cuts from their self-titled debut, released last summer through Dangerbird Records. As just a two-piece, much of their sound was pumped in through “Irene”, a backing tape player positioned in the middle of the stage that provided additional keys, bass, and other sounds to the band’s live set. Despite the use of pre-recorded sound, though, Schultz’s solid drumming brings the music to life and makes Bad Veins an interesting act to catch in a live environment.

Kevin Devine and the Goddamn Band

Kevin Devine and the Goddamn Band kicked things off at 8:50, opening with a jam-enhanced version of the title track from their latest album, Brother’s Blood. The band stuck heavily to that disc, continuing on with “Carnival” and “Another Bag of Bones”; the former was extended with a brief portion of Leonard Cohen’s “Democracy”. “Cotton Crush”, from Devine’s 2005 effort, sounded strangely thin and out of place compared to the more fleshed out cuts from his newer album. The Goddamn Band performed only as a four-piece, so the Brian Bonz-lead intro of “I Could Be With Anyone” was dropped, and the song actually sounded much less gimmicky without its beat-boxed intro.

Kevin Devine and the Goddamn Band

Brother’s Blood bonus track “She Stayed as Steam” surprisingly made the nine-song setlist, but it was the closing cover of LCD Soundystem’s “New York, I Love You But You’re Bringing Me Down” that highlighted Devine’s forty-five minute performance. Devine transformed a less-than-impressive original into a beautiful work of art, essentially eliminating any need for the studio version found on LCD Soundsystem’s Sound of Silver. A fine complement to Devine’s own “The Burning City Smoking”, lines like “your mild billionaire mayor’s now convinced he’s a king” echo with a weathered wisdom that Devine somehow manages to convey at only thirty years old. The song remains a live-only cover in Kevin Devine’s catalog for now, but with a history of recording a number of covers throughout his career hope remains that the song might one day be available for purchase.

Kevin Devine and the Goddamn Band

Guitarist Mike Strandberg followed Devine’s lead through most of the set, spicing up the normally straightforward singer-songwriter cuts. On songs like “Buried by the Buzz” it worked great, with drummer Mike Fadem providing a foundation to The Goddamn Band’s jams; cuts like “Just Stay”, though, work better with Devine alone with an acoustic guitar. With a more focused-attack, Devine could be unstoppable with a backing band. Unfortunately, though, his precisely written songs wander when he picks up an electric guitar — with such an extensive collection of remarkably executed studio cuts, it’s hard not to want more out of Devine’s live act.

Thrice

Beginning with the bassy rumblings of “All the World is Mad”, Thrice wasted no time jumping into material from the band’s latest full-length effort, Beggars. Pushing forward towards the stage, the audience sang along to the song’s catchy chorus in deafening numbers: “Something’s gone terribly wrong with everyone, all the world is mad / Darkness brings terrible things, the sun is gone, what vanity, Our sad, wretched fires”.

Thrice

“The Weight” was executed with precision, and, like most of Beggars, sounds much better in a live environment than recorded. Powered by guitarist Teppei Teranishi’s cutting lead, “The Artist in the Ambulance” was the blast that finally got the crowd dancing. The night’s highlight came early in “The Earth Will Shake”, one of Thrice’s strongest cuts; the song showcases the band’s terrific storytelling, dynamic song structures, and riotous singalongs. “Firebreather” and “The Messenger”, from The Alchemy Index‘s fire disc, went back to back and concluded Thrice’s opening assault of heavy songs.

Thrice

The reworked “A Song for Milly Michaelson” and “Circles” slowed things down temporarily; for “Doublespeak” frontman Dustin Kensrue grabbed a tamborine, and, despite its softer, piano-anchored verses, the song once again sparked the crowd’s fury with it’s heavy chorus: “There’s a jackboot toe tap keeping time while the children dance and play / Honey, if you think you’ve seen a crime, you just look the other way”. The abrasive qualities of “Hold Fast Hope” only sounded better in a live setting, and launching right into “Silhouette” only confirmed what the entire crowd was thinking: Thrice is nearly unparalleled in their genre when unleashing their heaviest songs. Whereas many heavy bands rely on blurred distortion and general cacophony, Thrice executes with maddeningly precise accuracy.

Thrice

“Come All You Weary” showcased the band’s slower, bluesy side; “Image of the Invisible” and “To Awake and Avenge the Dead” wrapped up the band’s setlist with back-to-back full-crowd singalongs. Thrice’s encore began with a surprisingly bland take on “Stand and Feel Your Worth” but concluded with a stellar performance of “Beggars” at 11:30. Kensrue poured his heart and soul into the song’s final words: “Tell me what can you claim, not a thing – not your name! / Tell me if you can recall just one thing that’s not a gift in this life?”

All the World is Mad
The Weight
The Artist in the Ambulance
Of Dust and Nations
The Earth Will Shake
Firebreather
The Messenger
A Song for Milly Michaelson
Circles
Doublespeak
Hold Fast Hope
Silhouette
Come All You Weary
In Exile
Image of the Invisible
To Awake and Avenge the Dead
Stand and Feel Your Worth
Beggars

Thrice

With about eighty minutes to pick and choose from nearly one-hundred songs in their catalog, Thrice did an exceptional job of mixing up new cuts — six from Beggars — with older, heavier favorites like 2002′s “To Awake and Avenge the Dead”. With such an extensive catalog of top-tier songs, there will undoubtedly be unfortunate omissions in any setlist the band constructs, but Thrice structured things well to showcase their diverse songwriting style. With first-class musicianship executing such a quality discography, Thrice easily surpasses their peers in a live environment and remains a must-see band.

All Thrice and Kevin Devine photos by the amazing Erica Livoti.

5 Comments | Bad Veins, Kevin Devine, New York, New York City, The Dig, The Fillmore New York, Thrice | Permalink
Posted by Anthony Charles Ambrose

Taking Back Sunday / Person L @ Sayreville 6/22/10

June 22, 2010

For the first time since 2003, John Nolan and Shaun Cooper returned to the stage with Taking Back Sunday, performing on a warm New Jersey evening at Starland Ballroom. With their “original lineup” in tact — note that the band actually shuffled members a few times before releasing a full-length album — the expectation was that the band would return to their roots, sticking heavily to their excellent 2002 debut, Tell All Your Friends. The show sold out immediately, packing 2500 rabid fans into the fairly small Sayreville venue.

Person L, the new project from The Starting Line’s Kenny Vasoli, provided lone support for Taking Back Sunday. Beginning at 8PM with “Goodness Gracious”, the band’s eight-song setlist dragged along for thirty-five minutes, failing to ever capture any purpose with their songs. On tracks like “Wooden Soldiers”, from the band’s 2008 debut, Initial, boredom quickly boiled into frustration with Vasoli simply repeating the phrase “when wooden soldiers catch their breath” over and over across the song’s five minute duration.

Person L

Playing in front of few who knew Person L’s catalog, the band took the opportunity to debut a brand new song, which sounded at home alongside cuts home on the band’s sophomore effort, The Positives. A few interesting hooks and some varied percussion — the five-piece employs two drummers — kept things somewhat lively, but ultimately Person L failed to secure anything memorable with their time on stage. There’s no doubting Vasoli’s heart, but it makes sense to question how his once-solid pop-songwriting has dwindled towards directionless jams.

Goodness Gracious
Wooden Soldiers
Good Days
Help Yourself
(new song)
(new song)
The Positives
Untitled

Following an uninteresting set from Person L, the lights dimmed and Michael Rapaport’s brief Beautiful Girls speech played through the PA. Most well known to those in attendance as the introduction to Taking Back Sunday‘s “Great Romances of the 20th Century” demo, a feeling of anticipation rushed through the venue. The first chords of “Cute Without the E” quickly cut the formidable tension, and the entire crowd rushed towards the stage, screaming the song’s opening accusation en route: “Your lipstick, his collar — don’t bother, angel, I know exactly what goes on.”

Taking Back Sunday

And like that, the “old school” Taking Back Sunday was off to the races. “Set Phasers to Fun” followed, and the crowd hungrily digested the 2004 Where You Want to Be opener. Brief, yet warranted, boos came from the crowd when the band began playing “Liar” from their 2006 effort, Louder Now. Luckily for Taking Back Sunday, the song’s soft introduction was quickly overpowered with distorted guitars and the displeased crowd was drowned out, but the message was clear: the older fans didn’t want to hear the band’s foray into mainstream alternative rock. Frontman Adam Lazzara introduced the long-absent “Bike Scene” by it’s original demo title and noted that that song is one of the oldest written by the lineup on stage. Power-chords slammed as hard as the crowd up until the song’s slower break during which the audience finally stopped moving. Lazzara took the moment of near-silence to acknowledge that co-writer John Nolan urged him not to record the word “silly” as part of the song’s bridge, but he laughed it off and went along: “You’ve got this silly way of keeping me on the edge of my seat.” Louder Now‘s “Error: Operator” was wholly unnecessary, but thankfully a tremendous cover of “Existentialism on Prom Night” followed. The entire crowd, most of whom followed Nolan in 2004 to his new band, Straylight Run, roared to the song’s signature riff. “What’s it Feel Like to Be a Ghost?” was introduced as a dance-number, but the band received considerably more crowd movement to the subsequent song, 2004′s “A Decade Under the Influence”.

Taking Back Sunday

The lone New Again cut of the evening, “Everything Must Go”, was a near five-minute document of Taking Back Sunday gone wrong. It’s not surprising, then, that the next song, the brand new “The Best Places to be a Mom”, was similarly disappointing — it looks like little has changed from the Long Island’s disastrous New Again songwriting process. “You’re So Last Summer” put the band back on the right track, though, even if it is one of the lesser cuts from Tell All Your Friends. In contrast, “You Know How I Do” was a home-run and possibly the highlight of the evening. The song captured everything good about Taking Back Sunday in a three minute, power-chord driven romp: diary entry lyrics, dueling vocals, and a simple why-didn’t-I-think-to-do-that musical composition.

Taking Back Sunday

“Baby Your Beard Hurts” returned for the first time since 2004, with a new subtitle, “Why Not a Sexy Pirate”, to boot. The song was enjoyable, even if much of the crowd was hearing it for the very first time, too young to have seen the band on their original Victory Records tours. “Great Romances of the 20th Century” and “Timberwolves at New Jersey” back-to-back were extremely solid, and the band closed things with “MakeDamnSure”, a disappointing end to an otherwise generally exciting set.

Taking Back Sunday

Luckily, Taking Back Sunday returned to start their encore just a few minutes later. With just Lazarra and Nolan together on stage, the reunited duo acted like old companions who finally realized that petty differences shouldn’t destroy friendships. After acknowledging the Bruce Springsteen influence that lead to hanging up a giant American flag behind the band, Lazzara played a few chords of The Boss’s “Atlantic City” before moving onto “Your Own Disaster”, originally recorded for the band’s five-song demo before Tell All Your Friends. A few tempo issues and some missed lyrics aside, the song was generally a success and a welcomed addition to the “throwback” atmosphere the band cultivated all evening. “There’s No ‘I’ in Team” appropriately concluded the night with Lazarra and Nolan trading line-after-line about heartbreaks and hatred.

Cute Without the ‘E’ (Cut from the Team)
Set Phasers to Stun
Liar
One-Eighty by Summer
Monterey Peninsula Bike Scene
Error: Operator
Existentialism on Prom Night (Straylight Run cover)
What’s It Feel Like to Be a Ghost?
A Decade Under the Influence
Everything Must Go
The Best Places to be a Mom
You’re So Last Summer
You Know How I Do
Why Not a Sexy Pirate (Baby Your Beard Hurts)
Great Romances of the 20th Century
Timberwolves at New Jersey
MakeDamnSure
Your Own Disaster
There’s No ‘I’ in Team

Tell All Your Friends cuts “Ghost Man on Third”, “The Blue Channel”, “Head Club”, and “The Ballad of Sal Villanueva” were unfortunately missing, but the band still played a solid nineteen song setlist. Lazzara’s vocals were surprisingly strong, and the rest of the band sounded tight and appeared genuinely happy to be playing together once again. Taking Back Sunday successfully executed their reunion show; the band now needs to prove that they won’t rely purely on nostalgia by writing their first worthwhile album in more than five years.

All photographs of Taking Back Sunday by the incredible Michael Dubin.

2 Comments | New Jersey, Person L, Sayreville, Starland Ballroom, Taking Back Sunday | Permalink
Posted by Anthony Charles Ambrose

The Gaslight Anthem / Rival Schools / Tim Barry @ NYC 6/15/2010

June 15, 2010

“We’re going to kick things off in New York City”, announced a paraphrased Brian Fallon to the Irving Plaza audience. “And we’re going to wrap things up in Jersey.”

The tri-state crowd, packed to capacity and sweating on a hot New York evening, responded with roaring applause. Of course, kicking things off meant the The Gaslight Anthem’s first show supporting the brand new American Slang. In choosing the 1000-person capacity Irving Plaza as the spot to unveil their latest effort on SideOneDummy Records , The Gaslight Anthem ensured an intimate celebration for the local scene that nurtured the band since their inception. The night served as a celebration of two worlds, with the quartet playing their new album in its entirety (minus closer “We Did it When We Were Young”) and also tossing in a healthy portion of material across their previous three discs.

Before The Gaslight Anthem, though, former Avail frontman Tim Barry opened the show, playing a thirty-minute folk-punk acoustic set. The Virginia-born singer-songwriter spent a portion of his set focusing on issues local to his hometown, Richmond, but still connected to the New York audience with worldwide themes of equality and justice. “Prosser’s Gabriel”, from his latest effort on Suburban Home Records, was a particularly intelligent look at the 1800 Virginia slave rebellion, questioning why history books seem to exclude mention of the state-issued murder of nearly thirty slaves. “Avoiding Catonic Surrender”, from Barry’s 2006 debut, Rivanna Junction, name-checked The Gaslight Anthem’s hometown and caught the crowd’s attention; with interest piqued, Barry thanked the crowd for showing up early to listen and closed with “Dog Bumped”, a true story about a friend locked in jail for murdering a man who had abused his sister.

Rival Schools performed next, playing a style in stark contrast to the previous half-hour of acoustic folk-punk. Best described as late 1990s hard/alternative rock, the four-piece failed to impress during their forty minutes on stage. The quartet sounded tight and precise, but their sound seemed tired. Their lone album, United by Fate, wasn’t particularly fresh when it was released in 2001 on Island Records, and the songs hardly hold up a decade later. Cuts like “The Switch” show that the band has vision, but most of the band’s best moments are quickly lost in humming guitars and droning rhythms. Frontman Walter Schreifels, a member of three of the most influential punk/hardcore bands over the last three decades (Youth of Today, Gorilla Biscuits, Quicksand), has much more potential than is executed with the recently reunited Rival Schools.

The Gaslight Anthem

Following a very quick set change, American Slang‘s title track kicked things off for The Gaslight Anthem, with a surprising number of fans singing in unison with frontman Brian Fallon’s opening words: “Look what you started.” Generally, the crowd is not supposed to sing along to your record release show. American Slang, however, leaked months before its store date and much of the audience came prepared. Still, the whole crowd wasn’t into it — The Gaslight Anthem’s live show thrives on singalongs, and a good number of fans felt left out during the show’s first few minutes. The New Jersey natives, with enough foresight and touring experience, rectified things with “Old White Lincoln” immediately following “American Slang”.

The Gaslight Anthem

The speedy “Stay Lucky” brought things back to new territory, but the crowd was dosed with enough adrenaline following an excellent performance of the previous The ’59 Sound favorite to keep things energetic and lively. “Bring it On” went next, followed by “The ’59 Sound”: not a body was still nor a voice silent — everyone in the building sang and danced along to the band’s breakout hit. The alternating punches of two of their most popular songs tossed into an otherwise straight play-through of their new album worked magnificently, displaying the quartet’s peerless vision of creating an exciting rock-and-roll concert experience.

The Gaslight Anthem

Of course, the fact that American Slang is absolutely awesome doesn’t hurt, either. “Spirit of Jazz” proved that The Gaslight Anthem can still craft a punk-driven powerhouse romp amidst an album full of more spacious, slower tempo cuts, and, for the first time performing the song, “Orphans” sounded as solid as anything else in their catalog. “Boxer”, minus Fallon’s staccato studio intro, was as good as if not better than its album counterpart. “Old Haunts” both reminisced in and dismissed the nostalgia of Sink or Swim‘s “The Navesink Banks”, seeming to indicate the band’s desire to move forward while still holding onto and balancing their past efforts.

The Gaslight Anthem

Dedicated to their friends and punk pioneers, The Bouncing Souls, The Gaslight Anthem embraced their past with “We Came to Dance”, and the crowd responded appropriately with waves of energy for the first Sink or Swim song of the night. “Blue Jeans and White T-Shirts” rounded out The Gaslight Anthem’s first set, and fans chanted for just a few moments before the quartet started their massive eight-song encore. The penultimate “Here’s Looking at You, Kid” — particularly the not-so-subtle reference to New York’s 7th Avenue — was met with erupting applause before the band wrapped up with an enormous performance of The ’59 Sound closer “The Backseat”.

American Slang
Old White Lincoln
Stay Lucky
Bring it On
The ’59 Sound
The Diamond Church Street Choir
The Queen of Lower Chelsea
Orphans
Boxer
Old Haunts
Spirit of Jazz
We Came to Dance
Great Expectations
Blue Jeans and White T-Shirts
The Navesink Banks
Drive
Wooderson
Even Cowgirls Get the Blues
Miles Davis and the Cool
Senor and the Queen
Here’s Looking at You Kid
The Backseat

The Gaslight Anthem sounded remarkable the entire evening, somehow managing to come off even tighter than their last already-excellent trip to the city. Fallon was playful, at one point kicking a balloon “in honor of the World Cup”, and the entire band seemed genuinely excited to be on stage in New York City for the first time in 2010. Set selection was top-notch; mixing up a straight run through American Slang with their biggest singles tossed in kept both die-hard and casual fans alike entertained throughout the entire evening.

The Gaslight Anthem wraps up the American Slang tour in their home state in August but return to Manhattan on September 30 to perform at the massive Radio City in what will be their largest headlining gig to date. Keep your eyes open for The Gaslight Anthem in 2010, and be sure to pick up the stellar American Slang. The many comparison’s to Bruce Springsteen and Tom Petty aren’t just sonic; The Gaslight Anthem might one day be a household name.

All photos by the incredible Lorraine Schwartz.

1 Comment | New York, New York City, Rival Schools, The Fillmore New York, The Gaslight Anthem, Tim Barry | Permalink
Posted by Anthony Charles Ambrose

inTuneMusic

Bayside @ Eatontown 6/26/2010

Thrice / Kevin Devine @ Sayreville 6/25/2010

Thrice / Kevin Devine / Bad Veins / The Dig @ NYC 6/24/10

Taking Back Sunday / Person L @ Sayreville 6/22/10

The Gaslight Anthem / Rival Schools / Tim Barry @ NYC 6/15/2010

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