WFNX Disorientation
Sep. 14th, 2008 09:23 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pryderEarlier this week I got an email from WFNX -- I won a pair of tickets to their Disorientation concert! I couldn't find anyone to go with me (I thought I had a taker but she backed out on Saturday) so one went to waste, but I went anyway and enjoyed the show a lot. I haven't seen any non-SCA live music in quite a while, so it was a treat.
It was a lovely warm evening at the Bank of America Pavilion (the current name of the waterfront concert venue in Boston); I had brought along a jacket in case the breeze from the water came in, but it never did. (I've seen a few shows there, and it can get quite chilly even on warm evenings. I especially remember freezing through Erasure in early June.) The Silver Line makes it a lot easier to get there; the T even showed a bit of clue and had a couple of Silver Line buses waiting at Silver Line Way, the station near the pavilion, to pick up the expected crowd at the end of the concert. (They didn't charge for the ride either, which made boarding quicker. I wonder if it was a special deal with the concert organizers.) I arrived a bit later than I expected to because the Red Line wasn't running to Ashmont this weekend (had to take the shuttle bus); I got to the pavilion at about 4:45, but the gates hadn't opened yet. (Scheduled opening was 4:30.) Everything ran about 15 minutes behind schedule, but the bands kept to their scheduled set lengths so things moved along well. Each act was introduced by a different person (or pair of people) from WFNX; by the end of the night, all of their weekday DJs had taken a turn on stage.
The outdoor area of the pavilion had booths for a bunch of places. I picked up a water bottle and a 50% off coupon from the New Balance table, a $5 coupon from the EMS table, and made a phone call to Marian courtesy of AT&T. I also bought a dish of Chocolate Therapy ice cream from the Ben & Jerry's pushcart -- yummy and intensely chocolate.
My take on the bands:
Does It Offend You, Yeah? -- the opening act. They played their one US semi-hit, Dawn of the Dead, in the middle of the set; the rest of their songs were less US-radio friendly with electronically processed vocals; think Daft Punk with more guitar and drum and you'll have the idea. I really like these guys, and their set was one a part of the show I really wanted to catch, but I'm not sure how big a success they'll be here in the US, because so much of their music doesn't fit into any of the usual niches. They've posted a bunch of their music videos and some podcasts on YouTube. Sadly, they didn't have much of an audience; I'd guess that the arena was less than a quarter full while they were on. They played a short set, only about half an hour; they released their debut album recently, so they probably have less material to work with than the other acts.
Next up was Anberlin, a short-notice replacement for Rogue Wave, who were unable to appear (their lead singer hurt his back earlier in the week). They are a five-member band that does straight-up guitar rock: two electric guitars, one bass, a drummer, and a lead singer who jumped around a lot in leather pants. For me they were the one disappointment of the show; their music failed to grab me at all. They weren't helped by the fact that their music hadn't been in heavy rotation on WFNX for the past month like the other bands. A few more people trickled into the pavilion, but mostly they seemed to be in the outdoor area; if anything, fewer people were actually in their seats (or standing near them) and listening. They played a slightly longer set, about 45 minutes.
The middle act was Alkaline Trio, and they were the first to really energize the crowd, which had grown substantially in time for their appearance. (In addition, it had gotten dark, so fewer people were at the outdoor booths, some of which had closed.) I found that I recognized more of their music than I knew; guess I had heard it over the years on FNX and had never made any special notice of the group. Not surprisingly, there were just three members: guitar, bass, and drums. The guitar and bass players took turns doing lead vocals, and the drummer added backup; despite there being only three of them, they had the best harmonies of the night. Of course they have a MySpace page and plenty of YouTube videos. They played a 45-minute set.
The penultimate act was The Kooks, the second UK act of the night. They're a huge success across the pond but only a modest one here; they're well known to alternative rock listeners but haven't crossed over to the mainstream. The FNX people encouraged the audience to crowd into the front section of the pavilion; I resisted, choosing to leave standing through two hours of the show for the teens and twenty-somethings. (Presumably they wanted to generate a bit more crowd energy, as well as allowing them to take better publicity shots.) By now the place was filled to somewhere around 80-90% of capacity; not a bad showing for a group of bands that would normally have played smaller venues, though the fact that the radio station gave away hundreds of seats didn't hurt. The Kooks did a good job of mixing song moods and tempos, including a pair of acoustic songs (the first was a solo by the lead singer on acoustic guitar; he was joined by a second guitar on the next) about 3/4 of the way through. Oddly enough, their biggest crowd pleaser, Do You Wanna, isn't one of the videos on their official YouTube site, but fans have posted it. The Kooks played for an hour.
Flogging Molly was the headline act, and they were clearly the group the crowd had come to see. Until their set, only a few people were dancing, but the crowd just wasn't able to keep still when they took the stage. They have seven members: the lead singer/acoustic guitar, two electric guitars, bass, drums, a woman who mostly played fiddle but did a couple of songs on pennywhistle (and the only woman to appear in any of the acts), and a guy who switched between banjo and mandolin. The lead also did all the talking between songs, and he was an expert at working the crowd, throwing in a lot of references to Boston and Massachusetts; at one point he thanked some of the band's inspirations and named two local favorites, Dropkick Murphys and The Mighty Mighty Bosstones. They've got an official website and a MySpace page; they don't seem to officially posted any YouTube videos, but their fans have. They played an hour set plus a two-song encore; the first 90% of the first song in the encore was an acoustic solo, with the rest of the band coming back on stage for the final chorus.
It was a lovely warm evening at the Bank of America Pavilion (the current name of the waterfront concert venue in Boston); I had brought along a jacket in case the breeze from the water came in, but it never did. (I've seen a few shows there, and it can get quite chilly even on warm evenings. I especially remember freezing through Erasure in early June.) The Silver Line makes it a lot easier to get there; the T even showed a bit of clue and had a couple of Silver Line buses waiting at Silver Line Way, the station near the pavilion, to pick up the expected crowd at the end of the concert. (They didn't charge for the ride either, which made boarding quicker. I wonder if it was a special deal with the concert organizers.) I arrived a bit later than I expected to because the Red Line wasn't running to Ashmont this weekend (had to take the shuttle bus); I got to the pavilion at about 4:45, but the gates hadn't opened yet. (Scheduled opening was 4:30.) Everything ran about 15 minutes behind schedule, but the bands kept to their scheduled set lengths so things moved along well. Each act was introduced by a different person (or pair of people) from WFNX; by the end of the night, all of their weekday DJs had taken a turn on stage.
The outdoor area of the pavilion had booths for a bunch of places. I picked up a water bottle and a 50% off coupon from the New Balance table, a $5 coupon from the EMS table, and made a phone call to Marian courtesy of AT&T. I also bought a dish of Chocolate Therapy ice cream from the Ben & Jerry's pushcart -- yummy and intensely chocolate.
My take on the bands:
Does It Offend You, Yeah? -- the opening act. They played their one US semi-hit, Dawn of the Dead, in the middle of the set; the rest of their songs were less US-radio friendly with electronically processed vocals; think Daft Punk with more guitar and drum and you'll have the idea. I really like these guys, and their set was one a part of the show I really wanted to catch, but I'm not sure how big a success they'll be here in the US, because so much of their music doesn't fit into any of the usual niches. They've posted a bunch of their music videos and some podcasts on YouTube. Sadly, they didn't have much of an audience; I'd guess that the arena was less than a quarter full while they were on. They played a short set, only about half an hour; they released their debut album recently, so they probably have less material to work with than the other acts.
Next up was Anberlin, a short-notice replacement for Rogue Wave, who were unable to appear (their lead singer hurt his back earlier in the week). They are a five-member band that does straight-up guitar rock: two electric guitars, one bass, a drummer, and a lead singer who jumped around a lot in leather pants. For me they were the one disappointment of the show; their music failed to grab me at all. They weren't helped by the fact that their music hadn't been in heavy rotation on WFNX for the past month like the other bands. A few more people trickled into the pavilion, but mostly they seemed to be in the outdoor area; if anything, fewer people were actually in their seats (or standing near them) and listening. They played a slightly longer set, about 45 minutes.
The middle act was Alkaline Trio, and they were the first to really energize the crowd, which had grown substantially in time for their appearance. (In addition, it had gotten dark, so fewer people were at the outdoor booths, some of which had closed.) I found that I recognized more of their music than I knew; guess I had heard it over the years on FNX and had never made any special notice of the group. Not surprisingly, there were just three members: guitar, bass, and drums. The guitar and bass players took turns doing lead vocals, and the drummer added backup; despite there being only three of them, they had the best harmonies of the night. Of course they have a MySpace page and plenty of YouTube videos. They played a 45-minute set.
The penultimate act was The Kooks, the second UK act of the night. They're a huge success across the pond but only a modest one here; they're well known to alternative rock listeners but haven't crossed over to the mainstream. The FNX people encouraged the audience to crowd into the front section of the pavilion; I resisted, choosing to leave standing through two hours of the show for the teens and twenty-somethings. (Presumably they wanted to generate a bit more crowd energy, as well as allowing them to take better publicity shots.) By now the place was filled to somewhere around 80-90% of capacity; not a bad showing for a group of bands that would normally have played smaller venues, though the fact that the radio station gave away hundreds of seats didn't hurt. The Kooks did a good job of mixing song moods and tempos, including a pair of acoustic songs (the first was a solo by the lead singer on acoustic guitar; he was joined by a second guitar on the next) about 3/4 of the way through. Oddly enough, their biggest crowd pleaser, Do You Wanna, isn't one of the videos on their official YouTube site, but fans have posted it. The Kooks played for an hour.
Flogging Molly was the headline act, and they were clearly the group the crowd had come to see. Until their set, only a few people were dancing, but the crowd just wasn't able to keep still when they took the stage. They have seven members: the lead singer/acoustic guitar, two electric guitars, bass, drums, a woman who mostly played fiddle but did a couple of songs on pennywhistle (and the only woman to appear in any of the acts), and a guy who switched between banjo and mandolin. The lead also did all the talking between songs, and he was an expert at working the crowd, throwing in a lot of references to Boston and Massachusetts; at one point he thanked some of the band's inspirations and named two local favorites, Dropkick Murphys and The Mighty Mighty Bosstones. They've got an official website and a MySpace page; they don't seem to officially posted any YouTube videos, but their fans have. They played an hour set plus a two-song encore; the first 90% of the first song in the encore was an acoustic solo, with the rest of the band coming back on stage for the final chorus.
