Last one ...

One more concert review, then I swear I'll get back to the top mcs countdown. Wednesday night I attended the sold out Passion Pit show at Bowery Ballroom with a few friends, 2 of which I would qualify as borderline super-fans. We arrived in time for the second opening act, the inappropriately named Paper Route, who did not in fact play emo or twee-indie pop. Instead they played U2-esque arena rock, which seemed tragically inappropriate to the size and constituency of the venue. I felt kind of bad watching the show, because I felt like I was doing the group a disservice by not pumping my fist, singing along, and raising a lighter throughout their set. Although U2 isn't really my thing, I kind of enjoyed some of their stuff, but did my best not to show it.

Passion Pit came on a little after 11, and, to quote Peedi Crak, the hoes went retarded. These guys are clearly very popular with the moderately hip, 20-25 female crowd, and everything song was enthusiastically received by the audience. The lead singer, Michael Angelakos, is kind of goofy looking, but the fans ate him right up. Actually, the guy has a really incredible voice, much better live than I was expecting. His falsetto sounds more fleshed out and tangible in person than on record, and he demonstrated incredible control of it throughout the entire performance. This was one of several unexpected delights of the show. Another was the first song the band performed, something new that I assume will be on their upcoming album to be released in May. Unlike most of the other group's songs, it leaned heavily on electric guitar, which was accompanied by swooping synths akin to ca. Apologies Wolf Parade. Of course Angelakos' soulful crooning lent the song an extra dimension, and the uptempo number was the show's highlight for me. Unfortunately, the other new material they debuted wasn't nearly as compelling, mostly just par for the course synth pop that I kind of forgot immediately. However, the band set the house on fire with its EP stuff, especially 'I've Got Your Number', 'Better Things', and 'Sleepyheads'. Amazingly, the set was over in less than 40 minutes (including encore) which might not have been surprising given the bands limited song repertoire if not for the fact that they didn't even play one of their best songs, 'Cuddle Fuddle'. Other than that oversight, however, the show was a lot of fun. Not sure if this group will be able to pull out as many good hooks for their full album as they had on the EP, but no matter what Angelakos has real chops, and I've got at least one good song to look forward to on the upcoming release.