Concert: Keane Perfect Symmetry Tour 2009 - Somewhere Only We Know

Keane Somewhere Only We Know from Head Explode on Vimeo.

We Might As Well Be Strangers (Live) from Head Explode on Vimeo.

The Perfect Symmetry World Tour started the 29 September 2008 and finished 29 October 2009, with 121 shows over the whole world. The concert above was recorded at the Fort Canning Park. In front of 6,000 fans on August 13th, 2009. It was also their first ever concert in Singapore.

Everyone were singing the first verse of the song, amazing atmosphere and fantastic fans! I think it was an underrated concert because there wasn't that much music mags review the show.

Concert: Pixies Doolittle Tour '10

After 3 long years, the Pixies has returned to Melbourne to celebrate the 20th anniversary of their 1989 album "Doolittle" which included some of the bands best commercial hits including "Wave of Mutilation", "Here Comes Your Man", "Debaser" and "Hey". The Doolittle tour has lasted for 4 days with 3 of them being sold out and i was lucky enough to get my hands on one of the tickets for the final Melbourne show.

Radical fans gathered in Festival Hall, Melbourne last night waiting enthusiastically while Rain Machine, the side project of TV On The Radio’s Kyp Malone, opened the show with a 30-minute set. Rain Machine was far better than any opening bands that I've been watching so far. Apart from the smokin' hot female bassist, I thought the band kicked the night off pretty well and the pressure to open for such a big band definitely wasn't an issue for them.

After the long wait, crowds started screaming the moment Pixies made their way up the stage without a word. Bassist, Kim Deal announced "B-sides" before they started the whole journey with “Dancing the Manta Ray". After 3 other B-sides, “Manta Ray,” “Weird At My School” and “Bailey’s Walk”, the backdrop visuals flashed "Doolittle", which marked the embarkation of the whole Doolittle tour. The Pixies broke into the crowd with the first track off the Doolittle album, "Debaser" which cast most off the fans dancing and singing along to the familiar song.

Frank Black definitely proved his ability to pack a houseful of force and volume in his voice with Deal's voice mingling at the back while she fired up the bass lines. It was quite interesting to see how the visual backdrops showed old grainy films that inspired the lyrics of the songs. The videos features odd imagery, nuns, blood red visualizations and lyrics that synced very well especially during the song "Hey" accompanied by black and white chains attaching.

The first encore was a surf version of Wave of Mutilation, a soft slowed down acoustic performance by the band followed up by the song Into the White. Towards the second half of the song, heavy dosage of fogs were released covering up the stage with Deal's voice echoing in the background while the band slowly faded which left the crowd wanting more.

Thinking that it was the end of the show, the houselights went on and the crowd went bonkers when the band showed up for a second encore. “These songs aren’t on the record,” said Deal before they brought the life back into the crowd by playing Caribou, Where Is My Mind, and Gigantic. It's really amazing how they consistently played all the classic favorites throughout the show, the gig felt more like "The Best of Pixies" show after all. Guitarist Santiago stole the limelight doing a brief solo when he played his ax with a bow and doing some spazzed-out effects using a drumstick he borrowed from drummer, David Lovering.

Here's the setlist for the night:

1. Dancing The Manta Ray
2. Weird At My School
3. Bailey's Walk
4. Manta Ray
5. Debaser
6. Tame
7. Wave of Mutilation
8. I Bleed
9. Here Comes Your Man
10. Dead
11. Monkey Gone To Heaven
12. Mr. Grieves
13. Crackity Jones
14. La La Love You
15. No. 13 Baby
16. There Goes My Gun
17. Hey
18. Silver
19. Gouge Away

Encore:
20. Wave of Mutilation (UK Surf)
21. Into The White

- words by Brian Foong

Concert: Kings of Convenience LIVE in Malaysia

A rainy Sunday evening somehow perfectly fit to be the right moment to listen to Erlend Øye and Eirik Glambek Bøe deep mellow gentle harmonies.

The Norwegian duo met at school when they were16 and started playing music together ever since. They just released their third political driven studio album Declaration of Dependence. We were lucky to be able to catch them live because they rescheduled (canceled) their US tour due to Eirik illness just a couple of weeks ago.

The early first half of the show starts off with their ‘bedroom’ songs and slowly shifted into more groovy songs that drove fans to twist and dance along with Erlend. Two of my favorite songs from the latest album My Ship Isn’t Pretty and 24-25 kicked off the set. 25-24 showed off their purely blessed delicate harmonies that sounded even quieter in my player!

Here is the setlist:
My ship isn't pretty
24-25
Me inside you
I don't know what I can save you from
The girl from back then
Singing softly to me
Second to numb
Mrs. cold
Little kids
Rule my world
Boat behind
Toxic girl
Homesick
Gold in the air of summer
Know how

-encore-
Misread
*New song?* (with Tndrfst)
I'd Rather Dance with you (with Tndrfst)


Kings of Convenience are unlike your typical acoustic musicians that will be just sitting on chairs and strum the guitars, they are actually good in creating all the playful interactions, from asking us to snap fingers, tap the feet and to sing along to Know How, Boat Behind, Ms Cold etc.

They did quite a lot of improvisation to the songs. Thank god they were all nicely done unlike Cat Power’s. The intro chords progression of the Misread took me by total surprise. While the “I'd rather dance with you” sounded more like another remixed version by The Postal Service. That was a good attempt but not an impressive one.

A few days before the show I actually heard the interview on BFM (98.9) with Tndrfst and they mentioned that Erlend actually emailed them and asked them to be the opening band. Why local band but not some other acoustic acts? Clearly it was Erlend’s intention because of his strong influence in electronica tunes and those encore songs that reminded me much of his solo album, Unrest (2003).

Thanks to Diana for the Riot on an empty street CD, one of the earliest records that got me into indie folk years back.

PS: Support our local Malaysian band. They are actually not bad at all! :)
Visit: http://www.myspace.com/tenderfist

Interesting lines by the duo that worth mentioning here:

“…silence plays a very important part in our music, so please for the first half of the show, keep your camera aside” – Erlend

“…I want you all to snap your fingers like this…*snap-snap*…what do you call it here?…(crowds: petik jari!) Yeah… petik jari!” – Erlend

“…we went to watch Zee Avi yesterday night, and we were like, hey~ there’s actually a scene here…unlike Singapore.” – Eirik

“…we need some drums here!!!” – Erlend

“…that was an attempt by Kings of Convenience to sound really loud…” – after Eirik’s guitar faced some technical difficulties.

“…this song was written back in 1998, while I was in London, I was feeling really down at the time…” – Erlend before begin to play Homesick

“..the reason why we don’t want to take picture with people is because there’s this saying that you’ll lose your soul if your picture is being taken…” – Erlend and Eirik

Other non-related crap:
The KoC’s soundman was wearing a tee of The Whitest Boy Alive. Nice one!