With special thanks to Tegan and Warner for hooking us up for the Brighton & London shows, we hopped, skipped and jumped our way to a selection of dates so we could produce a nice little tour diary for you.
Photos from all shows here:
http://s269.photobucket.com/albums/jj75/getglucky/ (download for personal use is A-ok but please ask permission before re-using them anywhere else)
Brighton:
The Concorde in Brighton was by far the smallest venue we saw T&S play during the tour, and while small usually = good for intimacy, the crowd was extremely over-excited and for the majority of the evening repeatedly directed their excitement in all the wrong ways.
I have no doubt Tegan and Sara are tough enough to handle most types of awkward/rude crowd situations but for the audience it just got annoying. From repeated shouting out of old song requests (we don't mean a few times, literally before and after every bit of banter or song, the same group were just shouting out for songs that they weren't going to play) to crude sexual remarks...we just felt awkward.
However, musically this did not phase the Quins one bit, playing through all of 'The Con' excluding 'Knife Going In' they gave a fantastic platform to an already fantastic album. Older songs like 'Monday, Monday, Monday' and the very early 'Divided' sounded completely refreshed sung by their now, far more experienced voices.
With the great banter they have come to be known for, their banter in Brighton did not disappoint; anecdotal gems about allergies, weird dreams, marriage;
and Sara Quin so accurately describing the loud/drunk group in the audience as 'Nancy' (that girl who from afar who looks like she's the life of the party but then when she's at a sleepover... she's the girl who gets her eyebrows shaved) It was pretty great.
They finished with the stunning 'Call It Off' but not before someone had to get a few final, shouted questions in. Tegan described a dream she had where her mom had written in the sky 'Life Is Hopeful'.
Fan: "I have a question"
Tegan: "You have a question, oh ok, what's your question?"
Fan: "Is life hopeful?"
Tegan: (Pause) "I like to think so, yes."
Even with the crowd being on the awkward side of rowdy, that's a pretty sweet way to end a gig. Shame the fan had to ruin her luck by wanting to ask more questions. But we'll just end it there.
Leeds:
By Leeds they had already revamped the set-list and brought in some new, old songs and taken out some of the previous set. 'Time Running' and 'Not Tonight' slotted in to the set perfectly with the former sounding louder and punkier than ever and the latter embracing the delicate and the melodic. Tegans electronic 'Are You Ten Years Ago' was probably an interesting and maybe challenging song to take from the recording to live, but it came off pretty flawlessly - with an addictively strong bassline and tightly sequenced vocals. Sara rounded off 'Walking With A Ghost' with a humorous explanation of trying to write an almost child-like song whilst carrying scarier undertones, in her own little strum-along sing song she explained to the kids, "Your mummy and daddy or daddy and daddy or mummy and mummy are getting a divvvooorce, but they still love youuu."
For Leeds videos: http://youtube.com/results?search_query=tegan+and+sara+leeds&search_sort=video_date_uploaded
Manchester:
Out went 'Floorplan' and 'Not Tonight' from the set-list, while 'Time Running' still made the cut. People threw glow sticks. People continued to shout 'Get Your Tits Out' (at these moments, embarrassed to be British? Check.) Sara quickly responded by pondering over when the live performance changed, it used to be rock stars in leather pants with girls on their boyfriends shoulders taking their tops off and now... the band get heckled to take their clothes off. Something went wrong somewhere.
London:
the particularly epic sounding 'Living Room'
After sharing how the 8 minutes alone in the womb without Tegan were the most calm and peaceful of Sara's life, and Tegan expressing their gratitude that each time they come back to the UK they are selling out bigger and bigger venues, the ladies took their bows and left us for European shores. We'll miss you two little Canadian wonders, do come back soon.
No comments:
Post a Comment