Swiss Fans And Ceilings
Nada Surf
Center Stage Theatre
Atlanta
May 30, 2008
You might not remember the band's name, but you probably remember 1996's Popular, by Nada Surf. Even though they've put out several really good albums since then and still tour pretty regularly, somehow they've never been able to follow up on their initial success with this song. When I first started listening to these guys a few years ago, I didn't even make the connection between them and the aforementioned hit - needless to say, Nada Surf are so much more than this classic. After several years of desperately wishing they'd come back to Melbourne, I finally got to see them last night - ironically, all the way over here in Atlanta. Given the ferality I've come up against from crowds in this city before, I did have misgivings about going - but at last I can say that the crowd, the venue and the band were all just about perfect.
The band themselves, particularly singer Matthew Caws, and chainsmoking bass player Daniel Lorca (look closely in the first photo below), are chatterboxes, frequently engaging in banter with the crowd between songs, such as entertaining everyone with the story of the Swiss fan who was so keen to meet the band that he climbed into the roof above the bandroom and somehow ended up falling through it. Lorca, with his dreadlocks flailing, and constant pacing around, is easy to fixate on, while Caws, though more understated, has a command of the audience that is never in doubt. Whilst they do each exude a certain, albeit dorky charisma, as a band, Nada Surf are tight and energetic, and last night they churned out a set full of crowdpleasers, leaning heavily on numbers from less recent albums such as Let Go and The Weight Is A Gift.
Amongst the many many highlights from last night's show were the opening and buoyant "Concrete Bed", immediately followed by the punchy, drum-heavy "Hi-Speed Soul". The gloomy "Kilian's Red" (named after a brand of whiskey, which I only figured out after sitting behind a guy on the bus with a Killian's Red cap on) was superb, as was "Fruit Fly". The newer "The Fox", easily missable at the tail end of their most recent album Lucky, demonstrated just how tight these guys are as a band, with its weird syncopated bass and drums blending perfectly with the lead guitar. Encouraging the crowd to do the two-step with him for "Inside of Love", Matthew managed to switch the mood of this beautiful song, from one of late-night-listening-wistfulness to toe-tapping-cheerfulness. I didn't manage to catch enough footage of this number since my memory card is now so stuffed with photos, it ran out of space about halfway through the show. Nevertheless, if you ever get a chance to see these guys play, do so!
Center Stage Theatre
Atlanta
May 30, 2008
You might not remember the band's name, but you probably remember 1996's Popular, by Nada Surf. Even though they've put out several really good albums since then and still tour pretty regularly, somehow they've never been able to follow up on their initial success with this song. When I first started listening to these guys a few years ago, I didn't even make the connection between them and the aforementioned hit - needless to say, Nada Surf are so much more than this classic. After several years of desperately wishing they'd come back to Melbourne, I finally got to see them last night - ironically, all the way over here in Atlanta. Given the ferality I've come up against from crowds in this city before, I did have misgivings about going - but at last I can say that the crowd, the venue and the band were all just about perfect.
The band themselves, particularly singer Matthew Caws, and chainsmoking bass player Daniel Lorca (look closely in the first photo below), are chatterboxes, frequently engaging in banter with the crowd between songs, such as entertaining everyone with the story of the Swiss fan who was so keen to meet the band that he climbed into the roof above the bandroom and somehow ended up falling through it. Lorca, with his dreadlocks flailing, and constant pacing around, is easy to fixate on, while Caws, though more understated, has a command of the audience that is never in doubt. Whilst they do each exude a certain, albeit dorky charisma, as a band, Nada Surf are tight and energetic, and last night they churned out a set full of crowdpleasers, leaning heavily on numbers from less recent albums such as Let Go and The Weight Is A Gift.
Amongst the many many highlights from last night's show were the opening and buoyant "Concrete Bed", immediately followed by the punchy, drum-heavy "Hi-Speed Soul". The gloomy "Kilian's Red" (named after a brand of whiskey, which I only figured out after sitting behind a guy on the bus with a Killian's Red cap on) was superb, as was "Fruit Fly". The newer "The Fox", easily missable at the tail end of their most recent album Lucky, demonstrated just how tight these guys are as a band, with its weird syncopated bass and drums blending perfectly with the lead guitar. Encouraging the crowd to do the two-step with him for "Inside of Love", Matthew managed to switch the mood of this beautiful song, from one of late-night-listening-wistfulness to toe-tapping-cheerfulness. I didn't manage to catch enough footage of this number since my memory card is now so stuffed with photos, it ran out of space about halfway through the show. Nevertheless, if you ever get a chance to see these guys play, do so!
posted by yossarian | 4:29 AM
6 Comments:
Yay- forgot how good these guys are live! Thanks for sending me footage (unfortunately didn't work on my computer- grrr) but will have to try and find my copy of Let Go!
Hope you're well and can't wait to hear your take on the guttural musings of Mr. Waits.
Hope you're well!
dang...if it's an .avi file i sent, it should be playable on any computer that has Quicktime. hope it's not an Apple vs PC thing...
Nope not sure what it is. Will try and do some fiddling around with computer maybe come up with a program that'll let me see it.
Thanks anywayz!
Hehehe *jumping with glee*
Aww thanks so much Yoss- but how did you get around it? Was thinking maybe there was something in the formatting with the footage you uploaded, remember having that problem with some YAI, M. Ward footage awhiles back.
Thanks heaps and it sure was good to hear that song again- your camera's really good, nice close up and music not too grainy! Yay!
hehe you're right yossarian! The band and song certainly didn't ring a bell at all, but when I youtube'd Popular the memory of the song came back!
The mirrors on stage look like they'd provide a great perspective for the crowd. Sounds like a great show and looks like you had a prime spot to see them!
m's - happy to oblige ;-)
jonno - yeah, i liked their "blind-spot" mirrors behind them too! the nice thing about the venue was that there were some elevated seats around the general admission area, which is where i ended up. kind of disappointing that there wasn't a bigger turnout though, but at least that meant it didn't get too congested. a great little venue!
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