Switchfoot Concert review

tonight, i witnessed one of the best concerts i have ever been to. hands down. see my next post which will recount what makes a good concert and what my top 5 are. but here, i wanted to break down the concert a little.

first, the disappointment. the band opening for Switchfoot was named "Copeland" and they were ok. they were drummerless, making just two acoustic guitars. it was kinda Shane & Shane-esque, but not to their level. The voice was alright and i was pretty pleased with the guitar work of the 2nd player. But in general, a bit of a letdown and i'd really like to hear them with a drummer before making any final judgements.

2nd on the sad scale- the concert was supposed to start at 7- it didn't start till 7:25. and while Copeland only played for about 20 minutes, it was almost 8:20 till Switchfoot finally came on. that made for a lot of standing around. the venue was nice and all- like a large night club, but the floor was concrete so it was tough to stand on.

Switchfoot enters, people scream. sometimes, i wonder if the screaming is louder actually than the music. So they start to play and it's nice and loud, very peppy. I can't honestly remember the order of some of the songs, all i can say is that as far as concerts go, these guys know how to translate their good studio work onto the stage (something bands like Jars of Clay had a hard time doing early on). It sounds just like the "Nothing is Sound" and "OH! Gravity" albums from which the first few songs come.

I would honestly compare this concert to an Audio Adrenaline concert i've been to. They have an excellent album that is the standard by which everything else they do is compared. and so far, they're measuring up to "The Beautiful Letdown" pretty well, although I hardly know the albums since the same way. But, it's like Audio Adrenaline's "Bloom"- if they do a lot of songs from there and add a few here or there, they can't go wrong.

Well, that's the feeling I got. a good smattering of their albums, but in general, center it all around the best complete album they've done. They played well, had excellent stage presence and just in general, made the audience feel a part of the show and not simply spectators.

Notable things:
inclusions- "Learning to Breathe"- from their self-proclaimed early years album by the same title, this song apparently was voted on their website to be in the concert. good song, loved to play it on the radio when i was a DJ in college. ahhh... memories. also, "Twenty-Four", one of my favorite songs of theirs. done just with the acoustic and in such a way that you could hear the audience singing along loudly. excellent.

exclusions- almost "Dare You to Move" until they did it in the encore, which plays into the idea that they planned the encore. "Chem 6a", a classic song from the "Legend of Chin" album that seems to make its way around, even being joked around on the guitar by one of the "Copeland" guitarists... Also, "On Fire", a light song off "the Beautiful Letdown" that just sings of serenity and beauty.

other notes- one kid actually brought a lighter into the concert. i'm not sure how he got it past security and they appeared to take it from him, but for the early part of the slower songs, this kid was waving his lighter... i felt like i was in 80s heaven or something... (and the dragon comes in the niiiiiiight!)

This concert ranks an A+ on the concert-o-meter. with classics like "Gone", "This is Your Life", "Stars", "Meant to Live" and new classics like "OH! Gravity" along side the other songs you know you know but just can't put your finger on it- this concert was great.