We Are Scientists with opening acts Eternal Summers and
Surfer Blood at The Turf Club in St Paul MN on October 9th, 2014.
Doors opened at 7 for the concert. I got there just before 7:30.
I hadn’t been to the turf club since First Ave took it over this past summer.
There were some minor changes that I noticed right away. The video games were
gone, not that I would have missed them. They were not all that popular of
video games anyway. The sound board used to sit on a small raised area with a
wood pedestal for the sound board to sit on, that was gone. It looked like the
soundboard was on a table with a black cloth over it now. It seemed like the
stage was bigger but I could have been mistaken. At the back of the stage was a
mural of horses racing which could have lead me to believe that there was more
space on the stage. The speakers were upgraded and or updated. Patrons used to
be able to get to the lavatories from both sides of the stage; they are behind
the stage. Now you can only get to the lavatories from the left side of the
stage as the other side has been walled off. There may be just more storage
behind that wall now as there is a new door in that spot next to the stage. So,
some minor changes have been made but the feel of the venue hasn’t really
changed at all. I forgot to check if there were changes to the basement so that
will wait for another visit.
Before getting a seat I went to the merch table to see what
they had for sale. I knew that I was going to get the tour split single from We
Are Scientists and Surfer Blood but I didn’t know what else was going to be
there. It seemed like I had, in one format or another, everything from both
Surfer Blood and Eternal Summers. I was happy to see that the Kanine
compilation, Non Violent Femmes, from Record Store Day was available and I
hoped that they were selling. Surfer Blood also had all of their big releases
up for sale including the punk version of Pythons that was released for Record
Store Day. Both records were on limited run for Record Store Day. They also had
the split single that I wanted. I bought it for ten bucks and it came with a
free poster. it was a little after 7:30 at this time and I just found out that
Eternal Summers was not on until 8 so I ran the single and poster out to my car
and came back.
Apparently Eternal Summers had been to Minneapolis one other
time. I may not have been into them to have known that they had been here
before. I was happy to be here now to see them play. There was a malfunction on
the guitar for the first song. The high E string was broken at the start of the
first song and singer/guitarist Nicole Yun didn’t see it until she started
playing that first song. She switched to her other guitar right after the song.
I was disappointed that she wasn’t able to play the guitar because it had a
great deep sound. She switched to a Fender Telecaster of some form. The
bassist, Jonathan Woods, played a four string Epiphone Thunderbird that sounded
amazing. I have wanted one of these guitars for a while and this just added
more fuel to that fire. I am not a drummer but I thought the drums sounded
pretty good and I have always liked Daniel Cundiff’s style though.
Eternal Summers played a few new songs that may be on the
upcoming album that they are working on. All of the other songs were the best
of the bunch it seemed like. I believe that all of the songs played were
singles from previous albums except for the three songs that I hadn’t
recognized before. I wish their set was longer because they have such an
extensive back catalog. I mean, they have three albums, a B-sides record, an EP
and a couple of singles that have B-sides not on the B-sides record. That makes
a lot of music that they have released. They could have been the headliners
with that big of a back catalog. I guess that I hope to see them again in the
future as a headliner because I want to hear more music from them in a live setting.
Keep it up guys!
After a bit of some set up/tear down from both Eternal
Summers and Surfer Blood and some volume adjustments for Surfer Blood they were
ready to go. Surfer Blood hit the crowd up right away with Floating Vibes and
segue right into Twin Peaks. I was also very surprised to hear one of my
favorite songs from the band, Miranda. That song also segues into Voyager
Reprise from the same EP. The lead singer, John Paul Pitts, got down off the
stage to sing and walk through the crowd on Drinking Problem and had the lead
singer for We Are Scientists play guitar. Pitts then dedicated the next song, Catholic
Pagans, to the lead singer/guitarist of We Are Scientists, Keith Murray, for
his birthday. I really liked the clarity of Pitts vocals for this set. I am not
sure what is so different about the way he sings/mix of his vocals but it truly
is amazing.
Since I came to see Eternal Summers and Surfer Blood and had
no back ground with We Are Scientists I left after the Surfer Blood set. Sorry
We Are Scientists you have never been on my radar. I will say this, if after
listening to the A-side of this tour single I have an interest I will check it
out further on YouTube and see what happens. It was a great concert for me,
even if I didn’t stay for the whole thing. Thanks to The Turf Club for having
these great bands
Eternal Summers set list:
Jammy (new song)
Wonder
Viper (new song)
Gouge
You Kill
Millions
Structure (new song)
I Love You
Never Enough
Surfer Blood set list:
Floating Vibes
Twin Peaks
Squeezing Blood
Weird Shapes
Miranda
Voyager Reprise
Take It Easy
Drinking Problem
Catholic Pagans
Gravity
I’m Not Ready
Say Yes To Me
Demon Dance
Swim
Anchorage
I picked up the set lists for both bands from We
Heart Music, although there were errors in the set list for Surfer Blood.
No comments:
Post a Comment