RE: Last November time, general conversation between me, Mike and Hayley-
You Heard this band? Owl City? Kinda like Postal Service but with a bit more beat and structure. Yeah, he's really good. We should go see him in Academy 3, Manchester.
Now:
Right, yeah Academy 3.... that all changed.I'm happy for the guy but at the same time gutted. You see Owl City's fan club are the bottom of the scales. And by that i mean the age scale and weight scale. They are very very young. More on that later.
The trip there was fun. The snow worried us, made us take 2 de-tours and made the Peaks look like the Alps. We passed the giant nipple hill and made our way through the hills. Struggling upwards in the car that somehow got us to London and back without a blink.....always an event with Dyall. Passing an absurd amount of derelict boozers also worried me. I had a rather 'ARE YOU LOCAL?' feeling in my stomach.
We got to Manchester in good time though so all was well, got parked, nipped to subway. Standard. In subway was an interesting student newspaper which had a review of Owl City's album 'Ocean Eyes'. One out of five stars..... I like the album myself, the fact it bares resemblance to Postal Service is a good thing. Not for that reviewer. Ripping the shit out of him seemed enjoyable in his writing. Aw well, we were there by then, we were gunna see him live.
The queue was ridiculous, so a pint was in hand. To do this we had to walk down the line of youngsters. I'm not gunna lie, there was a sinking feeling in my tummy. But all was well, a nice cold pint helped that. In we went to the Academy and stood in the crowd. I could see everything :) it was nice. The support band The Lights from Canada had started. They were very Owl City style to be honest but a woman singer. A stunning woman singer at that. The fact they were Canadian made all her talks to crows hard to listen to because all i wanted her to say was 'about' or 'aboot' in Canadian. She was alright musical wise though. Apart from the last two songs were just her and an acoustic guitar, they were a bit boring.
Owl City time. Now by now i was looking forward to this, but scared shitless of 'Fireflies' at the same time. Screeching girls in my ears was a terrifying thought. He came on and people went wild. Accompanied by 2 keyboard players, a drummer, 2 violinists and a guitar player. Played a lot of Ocean Eyes, as expected, including *sigh* 'Fireflies', 'Saltwater Room', 'Vanilla Twilight', 'Dental Care' (which has the worst lyrics of any song ever written) and my song of the gig - 'Meteor Shower'. For the 5 mins that he/they played that song, it felt like a proper gig not a concert. It felt more like Airborne Toxic Event then Owl City. Starting with a stunning violin/synth intro then a moment of silence crescendoing into the slow, light played piano start of the verse. Then bursting into the chorus with a true sense of atmosphere. Lovely. Adam/Owl City had a great sense of stage presence, reminded me of Thom Yorke from Radiohead in the way he moved, held onto the mic. Yet looked like Damon Alburn from Blur. Interesting mix.
He played 'Fireflies' and the daunting sense of people around me knowing only that song sunk in. Starting with the annoying girls behind us that thought an amusing way to spend the rest of the gig would be to steal mine and Mikes hats and complain about wanting to home. Urgh.
We decided to play it safe and use the motorway to go home. Didn't fancy the Alps at night.
All together a good night and a surprisingly good gig. Good times. Next gig is You Me At Six w/ Forever The Sickest Kids and We The Kings. This I am looking forward to :)
Peace
x
p.s. Jesse did it again... Good girl
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