Sunday, April 27, 2008

Tapes 'n Tapes - 9:30 Club (4/23/08)

I had high hopes for this concert. I was a fan of The Loon and felt that the boys from Minneapolis did us right with their second effort, Walk It Off. While I was surprised to see that they booked their DC show at the 9:30 Club vice the Black Cat, the price was right ($15) so I figured I didn't have much to lose.

The night started off well, as I was able to secure a ticket outside for under face value. I was feeling pretty good about myself until the the girl right behind me scored a free ticket from someone else. It's okay though, she was hotter than me.

For some reason, headed to the bar across the street to whack a few brews back and catch some of the Phils game. When I finally headed into the 9:30, I overheard a few guys smoking outside commenting about the quality of the opening band, White Denim. Damn!

The club was maybe half full - probably closer to a third. While I didn't expect it to be packed, I definitely thought there would be a few more people in attendance. Tapes 'n Tapes hopped on stage and blistered through their setlist, front loading tracks from Walk It Off. I think they stopped to talk to the crowd twice and both times it felt really forced. Something also wasn't quite right about their sound and it was a serious distraction for me. The only thing I could figure was that the instruments and vocals were at the same volume level, making the vocals just another "noise" instead of being distinguishable (does that make sense?).

They probably played 15-17 songs in about an hour and it seemed like they couldn't get off stage fast enough. Maybe they had somewhere cooler to be...

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