"Twilight" Glee
Several months ago, a couple respected comrades raved to me about a new group out of Scotland called, The Twilight Sad. I procured a copy of their EP, and was immediately hooked by the brooding lyrics, banging drums, and pulsing guitars with splashes of keys & accordion for good measure. Their first full-length LP, Fourteen Autumns & Fifteen Winters, was released last week and it pretty much has instantly become my favorite record of the year thus far. And it is up against some pretty strong competition. 9 cuts deep, running at a trim 45 mins, leaves nary an ounce of fat on this album, which definitely sets it apart from the rest.
Well last night, I had the pleasure of seeing The Twilight Sad live in concert at The Knitting Factory here in lovely Hollywood, CA. After a glowing review of their recent show in NYC by my trusted music connoisseur associate, MRL, my expectations were running particularly high. The three young Scotsmen, took the stage stealthily and proceeded to cast a spell over all those in attendance. Playing half the songs in their known canon, the set was a robust albeit brief delight. Frontman James Graham's verses are certainly poetic and you can see every ounce of emotion pour as he both croons into his 50's style microphone and bellows to the heavens throughout the performance. The real show stopper came with the track 'Talking With Fireworks/Here, It Never Snowed' where Graham kneels in front of drummer Mark Devine's kit and with a single stick straight up murders the cymbal whilst on his knees until a few measures of quickly paced tick-tick-ticks by Devine's own sticks mellow out the pace for Graham to come in pondering, "And does your fear not grow when you see that you're all mine/See that you're all mine/With a knife in your chest." Who else but a bloke from Glasgow could come up with lyrics like that?
There's something so nostalgic about seeing an emerging band play a small venue because you know the chances of seeing them again in this type of setting are finite. Living in L.A. has granted me many such opportunities; e.g. Muse at The Mayan, Arcade Fire at Spaceland, and most recently Menomena at The Echo. These gloriously fortunate events are few and far between, but obviously that's what makes them so monumental; memories that do not soon fade into the twilight.
-- M
posted by diamondcutz @ 2:48 PM
2 Comments:
Being at this show was a glimpse into the future. We experienced something that would belong in the first ten minutes of a Behind the Music. You could see the drama onstage, and imagine all of the future drama...the lead singer going off the deep end, quitting the band to go solo, but his brief solo career would not be as universally applauded, only to reconcile with the band, and proceed to make their most critically acclaimed and innovative album, forever canonizing them in the history of music...or maybe that was a Saved by the Bell episode...but when Twilight Sad's lead singer was caught making out with the violinist of the opening band A Northern Chorus, I was neither surprised nor disappointed. Rather, it is a testament to their present and future awesomeness.
Reminds me of the night I went to see Asia with special guests Zebra at the Mid Hudson Civic Center in Poughkepsie, NY.
Blaise Sackett's older brother Nick had crammed all us kids into the back seat of an Olds station wagon, leving us alone with a case of Genesse Cream Ale-- "Jenny Screamers" is what the cool cats called 'em.
Well, I drank about twelve of them. One for every year of my existence. By the time we got to the show, about twenty seconds into "The Heat of The Moment" I grew quite ill and made a mess on the floor...from what I recall.
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