I have this thing about going to concerts. It’s like this joyous phobia, I always tell myself that I want to go then at the last-minute I don’t, but when I do end up going I always end up having a good time.
The Neon Indian show was a perfect example of this joyous phobia. I have always been a casual fan of Neon Indian’s music, but have never really gotten into the electro chill bleep soundings of Alan Palomo. That being considered, I had this sneaking suspicion that his music might come across pretty cool live. So after doing a bit of research and discovering that there was actually a live band involved and not just Palomo pushing buttons on a laptop I was sold.
Urban Lounge is always a fun place to see a show, its such a small venue that no matter where you stand you can usually get a good view of whats going down on stage. The Bearded Gentlemen posted up in the back because that’s where cool people hang to watch shows and eagerly waited for the opener Friends to take the stage. I had purposely not done any research on the opening act for the show because I didnt’ want to have any expectations. Openers are always tricky… they are either annoying, boring or amazing.
Friends were pretty close to being amazing. They took the stage and immediately jumped into their party flavored electronic bounce fest. This band was surprisingly good and captivating. Although, I do have to say that the highlight of their performance was couple of care free dudes in the crowd hopping around and pulling some pretty ridiculous dance moves. Singer Samantha Ubrbani and bassist / keyboardist Lesley Hann were confident and sultry, while the rest of the band was tight and on point. This group has Bee Gee type bass lines for days. I’m stoked for their full length to come out in June. (Check em out…)
After Friends finished getting the crowd stoked and in the dance party vibe Neon Indian and took the stage and as soon as the live drummer started pounding away it was on. One wouldn’t really think of the Neon Indian’s popped out, A.M. Radio, smoothness as having a bunch of live energy but, Alan Palomo’s band is bad ass! The band consisted of a live drummer two keyboardists and a bass / guitar player with Palomo contributing in instrumentally between his dope fleet-footed dance moves.
There was also an anonymous sixth member on stage who went un-recognized, this sixth member was a giant casket shaped glowing monolith disco-orb whose sole purpose was to hypnotize and blind the audience with calming, blissful, euphoric technicolor lights. This casket monolith did it’s job tremendously.
Paolomo puts off a great stage presence of Prince meets Keanu Reeves and at one point described the crowd as “Vibey” which we definitely were. I definitely enjoy Neon Indians jams a lot more after experiencing their tight, ubeat live show.
Extra props to the drummer Jason Faries for playing super hard and kicking things into gear and again additional props to the two crazy dudes that had awesome dance moves all night. If you guys read this hit us up.
(Here’s a shitty clip of “Fallout” filmed on my phone)
(Another horrible clip from my phone where you can see Faries going to town)