arcade fire

the arcade fire was fun. i like concerts. the greek theater was a good venue to see the arcade fire in, because there are a bunch of singalongs.

10 people onstage. in the top right, two horn players: one was on trumpet/french horn, and the other was on saxaphone/french horn. he’d let his giant sax dangle from his neck and pick up a french horn and turn his head all the way sideways to play it, then put it down and play his sax again during songs. next to them, middle back, was the drummer. i like drummers. they go crazy. at one point he switched with a girl in a pink sash and pink hair ribbon and he played the keyboards for a while. then, back left, was a guy who played the xylophone like a madman. for one song, he played an organ. with giant silver pipes. that was pretty cool. bottom left was a guy who ran around drumming on things and shouting into megaphones (which they all did) and playing the keyboard. for one song, he banged on a cymbal with one hand and banged on the keyboard with the other. for another song, he ran around banging his drumsticks on something different every measure–the singers’ mic stands, the metal supports to the stage, the lights. he put a helmet on a stick and banged on that. then there was the aforementioned pink-sashed girl that cranked this strange wooden device, and an accordion, and sang lead on some songs, and had bracers on her wrists that also had bells on them. i want bracers like that. badly. she could sing high, and that sounded good, almost like a strong clear falsetto, but her chest voice was pushing it a little at parts, maybe it was just cold. i liked her white boots. the main singer guy broke a lot of strings on his guitars. after one, he said “when i’m standing in front of the pearly gates, i can look at st peter and say: i broke my low e string during the softest song on the set.” he also said “your fog broke my amp. thanks a lot, motherfuckers… just kidding… it’s not your fault… i’ts your… character… if you didn’t have fog like this, you wouldn’t write all these songs about the california days filled with sunshine… take the good and the bad…” then there were two string players: one violin and one viola, i think. they both sang while playing their instruments sometimes. that was awesome. i counted 10 people on stage but this is only 9. one more must have been banging on something. oh, and someone brought out a giant double bass painted silver for a song or two, too.

i like their sound. rockin’. favorite was a song that the girl sang lead on, not because of her (i don’t think she was very strong tonight) but because of this heartbreaking sequence on the strings. oh it was beautiful. and of course, they walked off stage after the end of the proper set singing the “oooo” refrain to the last song they played, and amidst the cheering, the stadium kept it up until they came back for the encore. that’s a lot of fun. i like the greek theater.

i brought three blankets and used one. i missed elecrelane, mostly–what i heard as we were looking for seats sounded like some loose improv and a kaoss pad, haha. screechy guitar sounds