Playing first on a quiet Tuesday night on a bill featuring fellow up-and-coming indie bands COLD WAR KIDS and SOUND TEAM, MIDLAKE showed why they’re one of the best up-and-coming bands in the US today. They played for almost an hour, which is unusual for an opener, but it was well worth it as they got to play most of their spectacular new album, The Trials of Van Occupanther. In particular, the FLEETWOOD MAC-like “Roscoe,” the electronic-tinged “Young Bride” and the soaring “Head Home” were standouts.
In addition to having three different keyboards/samplers and lots of guitars and a large drum set-up on stage, their stage decor featured the panther mask that a band member wore on the cover of the new album. Though Midlake could have gotten by on the performances of these songs alone, most of them were also augmented by videos for each individual song that played on a screen behind the band, much like what I saw THE BOOKS do back in March. In particular, this amazing video for “Young Bride” stood out alongside others for songs from the new album like “Roscoe” and “Van Occupanther.”
Since they got a fair amount of time to play, we also got to hear songs from their previous album Bamnan and Slivercork, like the amazing single “Balloon Maker” and “Some of Them Were Superstitious.” Most of the old songs were augmented by creative videos as well.
Since we had tickets to see THE FUTUREHEADS at the First Unitarian Church, which is in a different part of town, we had to leave after Midlake’s set, so we missed Cold War Kids and Sound Team. Thus, I can’t review either of them, which is unfortunate since I’ve heard a lot of buzz around both bands.
The above photos come from the flickr account of ashbloem and they were taken at their show the next night at the Boston club TT the Bears.
