Toronto – It is not often that I go see a band twice for the same album tour (off the top of my head .. Franz Ferdinand … The Pipettes .. the Rapture). So when I do go, it is often because the first show was awesome. Such was the case with the Klaxons. A lot has happened to this band since I last saw them in April, more specifically, they won the Mercury Award, which is the most prestigious award to win if you are an UK band. It is like the HGH for the music scene. Once you get it, its all home runs baby, all home runs.
So naturally, when they returned to Toronto, they played a much bigger venue – The Opera House (capacity: 850) which is significantly larger then Lees. Wikipedia lists Lees capacity at 600, but I highly doubt that. I would say 350 max. Anyways, so point is, they played to a much larger crowd this time around.
I am not the biggest fan of the Opera House, it is far away, there is realistically only one bar to pre-drink and they got those black guys in the bathrooms. I HATE that. Okay, maybe those guys aren’t always black, saying that would be racist. I hate the bathroom attendants they have at various night clubs. Its like dude, i might be drunk, but i can wash my own f’n hands and dry myself off. I just don’t see why clubs have to be like that, and the people who do that, is that really the best they can do? Wash the hands of drunken people every friday and saturday night? Might as well end it right there buddy, life is certainly throwin ya to the gutter.
I guess its more of a social problem, because maybe if those guys arent washing our hands and giving us towels, then they are on the street and maybe they might mug people and stuff, so on second thought, perhaps its not that bad. I can deal with not tipping them once in a while.
Onto the show. Man was it completely different from last time. Last time, as you can read in a previous post of mine (here) was pure shenanigans. Glow sticks, surfers, stage divers, people dressed like they were colorblind..everywhere. This time around, typical Toronto crowd. I don’t even think people knew what the first tune was (the bouncer) because it wasn’t on the album. So basically, this was a ‘lets go to this hyped up band and check them out’ kind of crowd. The person standing besides me was just obsessed with taking pictures with his dinky little point and shoot camera, from quite a bit away. I wanted to tell him to give it up, but I’ll let him soak in his disappointment when he loads the crappy pics he took on his imac. Him and his girlfriend were both wearing earplugs too. Man, if you are gonna wear earplugs at a concert, it just proves that you should be seeing rod stewart or clay aiken or something. Get out of there.
musically, the band was solid, and the concert was pretty solid. but it didn’t have the same energy level as the first time. I guess that can be expected, as the venue was bigger and the crowd was definitely different. Perhaps my expectations were too high, but I have noticed a trend – the second time around, not always as good. I still enjoyed the show however, my only real disappointment (other then the ones i’ve mentioned) was that there really isn’t a good chinese restaurant near the place, as I was craving congee after the show (soul food for us china mens).
Review: 3/5, if I had not seen the other show, probably 4/5. so depends.
PS: I WISH they played this song, which is a cover of one of my favorite 90s tunes
