AFI

support Blindside
author TL date 11/05/07 venue Pumpehuset, Copenhagen, DEN

It seems I'm spending more and more time in Pumpehuset, which is hard to regret in any way, as it is a cool slightly-larger-than small venue (capacity of 600), acting more and more frequently as a checkpoint for cool bands coming through Denmark on tour. Tonight however, it seems I might have spent a short while too long outside of the venue (in the cue, getting slightly affected by some very fine brew), because suddenly when I'm inside and waiting to park my bag in the wardrobe, I hear noises coming from upstairs hinting that Blindside, supporting the headliners AFI tonight, must have gotten an early start to the set.

Blindside

Naturally I race up the stairs to do my God-given duty as a reporter for you guys. But after having arrived, I quickly discover that the rush might have been a quite unnecessary exaggeration, because quite frankly, and this is in no way personal but, Blindside simply suck ass tonight. To be fair, they don't have the circumstances with them though. The sound levels are, for once in this venue, utterly crap, and they must have been set up by a drunk person. During the few periods where you can actually hear Christian's vocals, they still sound like they simply do not belong to the music. Aside from that, someone had decided to leave the lights on in the room, and simple as it might seem, it is really bad for the mood in especially a warmup set that has started early, as it reveals the emptiness of the concerthall in a pretty discouraging way. Returning attention to frontman Christian, we can see that he's utilizing his entire arsenal of classic post-hardcore showman tricks in a struggle to make the bands set interesting. Something the rest of the band don't really seem like they're warmed up for. This means all that's left for the audience to enjoy is a severely crippled version of the bands music, cut into a small and in my opinion even more crippled setlist, as the band has somehow decided not to play "Eye Of The Storm". Sorry guys, but tonight is the kind of night we only enjoy in brief moments. The rest of the time we just yawn and wonder how long the break between you and AFI will be.

4

AFI

As one would usually expect when waiting for a name as huge as AFI, the wait tonight turns out to be pretty long, and while I'm busy feeling annoyed with my feet hurting from too much running around the city to get to interviews, I manage to squeeze in a small prayer to try to persuade the soundscapes to improve for their set. Apparently, God does exist, and what people say about his sense of humour isn't too far off either.

"Prelude 12/21" fills the air and the usual release of crowd-anxiety follows as the band enters and quickly makes it clear that the sound really has improved.. Slightly.. Barely notable (Geeh thanks God). However it takes me something like two full seconds to forget why this mattered so much, as the quite predictable worshipping of this band ensues, complete with relentless chanting of every single word of the lyrics. It's already safe to leave it as a fact, that tonight is one of those concerts where the frontmans' microphone might as well be switched off. No doubt you guys know what kind of phenomena I speak of. Even here, in the smallest venue the band plays on this tour, they are so loved that their victory march is commencing before they ever even ride into battle. One of the reasons they are so loved however can very well be the fact that none of this seems to motivate them to even consider slacking this one off. From the first second of set-opener "The Leaving Song Pt. 1" (if my ever more wasted memory serves), Davey is all into it.

Dancing and parading himself around stage, one moment seemingly seized with emotions, the next standing proud on one of the front speakers, directing the crowd as they follow his every motion. "Kill Caustic" follows and while Jade and Hunter add to the show by rockin' out, we're taken on a journey through, you guessed it, the two most recent albums Sing The Sorrow and Decemberunderground. To the surprise and delight of the majority of the crowd the former is the more strongly represented, and while the sing alongs are massive during songs like "But Home Is Nowhere" and "Silver And Cold", it's the beauty of it when Davey and Jade perform "The Leaving Song Pt. 2" on their own, the bitter rage of "Death Of Seasons" and the sheer presense of the "Hidden Track" that blows our minds tonight. Still the band does not rest though, as we of course have yet to witness "Summer Shudder" and "Love Like Winter" and also a surprise cover of The Cure's' "Just Like Heaven". And as if the band's usual theatrics isn't enough to outdo most others out there, Davey of course has to top it all by climbing onto the railing and suddenly standing upright in the crowd for a seemingly unending moment of glory. Somewhere along the way, the band of course also plays "Girls Not Grey", "Paper Airplanes (Make Shift Wings)" and "Dancing Through Sunday" along with some older songs I simply can't remember the names of, and in the end they walk off stage only to predictably return to a more than convicing applause and chantings of "AFI! AFI!". Noone is surprised when the encore is closed off with "Miss Murder" but then, there's hardly a disappointed soul in the room either.

I know AFI has become the kind of band all scenesters would love to see fail, as they've abandoned their original style pretty much, but let's face it: You're just not around for so long, achieving what they have, without becoming pretty God damn good at what you do. And even despite tonights' sound problem, these guys still show most upstarts how it's done.

Comments
comments powered by Disqus

Legal

© Copyright MMXXIV Rockfreaks.net.