Hillary and I went to see South at the Independent last night - a rather quaint little venue just outside of the Haight Ashbury. Despite my best efforts, I managed to get us there on time - which ended up being a good thing, because opening band Margot and the Nuclear So and So's were quite splendid. Their mix of Conor Oberst-like vocals with the luscious sounds of a band featuring keyboards, guitar, two percussionists and horns was fantastic. And they gave us a free cd afterwards, in addition to playing with both bands that followed. Second act Something For Rockets were not nearly as good, despite boasting a keyboardist with an awesome mustache. I found their sound to be rather generic, with Hillary calling it "indie rock for jocks."Around 10:50 came the main attraction - the UK trio known as South with two additional musicians for the live set. While they sounded good from the get-go, opening with tracks from the new album before dipping into the back catalogue a bit, I felt like they really hit their stride as they went along. Frequent singer/bassist Joel Cabury gave a promise that they would "play their hearts out" and I say that's a fair description of what happened. A high point came near the end with a rather epic version of "Shallow," after which everyone exited but Cadbury who performed a beautiful rendition of "Flesh and Blood." That experience was marred only by the fact that the sound didn't quite drown out the drunk assholes chatting (why did they even come???). Declaring no encore pretension necessary, the four others returned and concluded the show with a great cover of "Bizarre Love Triangle." Ending at about midnight, we exited the club, hopped in a cab and headed home. I still had to get up rather early for work this morning, but that was a small price to pay for such a lovely evening.
::Previously::
1 Review: Adventures In The Underground Journey To The Stars / South
2 comments:
Weird - I was just hearing about Margot and the Nuclear So and So's on CBC this weekend. You've gotta love a band with a cello and a big honkin drum kit.
As for South, I'm always a sucker for a New Order cover,
Sounds like it was a grand show, despite the chatting assholes. They should make people who insist on getting drunk and yapping watch nothing but Sum 41 shows or something similar, where it doesn't matter.
It was so much fun, thank you, Will! South seem like really cool guys and it was just a lovely show.
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