Manchester Orchestra at HOB
I dragged myself down to HOB last night to go to the Manchester Orchestra show. Well, I guess it was really the Say Anything show, with MO as support (along with two other bands, one of which is Weatherbox, who is a SD band). I had really had it with the tween crowd, so I ended up sitting at the bar drinking until the last possible moment that I could actually go in before Manchester Orchestra started.
They started off strongly with “Wolves at Night”. I was a little distracted though because Andy did something weird to his hair - he shaved off a whole section of it on the top. So it looked like male pattern baldness but not really because it was obviously shaved and the rest of his hair and beard were still rocking so it just looked strange. After I focused on the task at hand though, it was obvious to me that they were going to put on a great show. Andy wore his heart on his sleeve as he is wont to do. When they got to “Golden Ticket”, I was really feeling the material. “Golden Ticket” was a good segue into a new song. They teased CYHSY’s “Satan Said Dance” at the end of it, which I think really confused the tween crowd. I think I scared some of them next to me as I was part of the small crowd that knew we were supposed to answer back with “Said Dance!”. The last two songs were intense. First, the poignant “I Can Barely Breathe”, complete with cut-yourself-lyrics:
if you knew I was dying would it change you?
So when you see me falling backwards down the wall that says I’m still alive,
don’t be cautious when I’m cautiously approaching on the other side
everybody has their reasons, that’s the reason we’re all going to die
They ended with a no-holds-barred version of “Where Have You Been” with guest drummers (I’m guessing from the other bands.) At some point near the end of the song, Andy got rid of his guitar and ended up on the floor writhing around singing the lyrics.
A partial set list if you rock on. I’m still working on it as I didn’t do a very good job with taking notes and there wasn’t a set list to cheat with at the sound booth.
