heart & sound

Metric Love Rocks the Orpheum

On tour for their fourth studio album, Fantasies, Metric played the Orpheum theatre in Vancouver on Tuesday, November 3, 2009 to a crowd of avid listeners.

Having mostly seen Metric play 19plus shows, the all-ages aspect of their show drew attention to the fact that, thanks in part to the new local radio station The Peak, Metric is gaining some status with a younger as well as a more mainstream music audience.

The band’s gilded performance dazzled and not just because of the lights or singer Emily Haines’ gold sequined dress. Blending songs from Fantasies with hits from Old World Underground, Where Are You Now? and Live It Out, the foursome played a solid show, complete with Haines’ characteristic dancing and even some inspirational chit chat between songs.

Haines stated that it’s time for our ADD, MySpace generation to produce another band like Led Zeppelin, and although she didn’t volunteer Metric to fill those shoes, most of the audience members would likely have been happy to nominate them. Before breaking into an unyielding performance of Gimme Sympathy Haines continued, “it’s not about romanticizing the past but acknowledging what sucks about the present,” as she crumbled a plastic cup that an audience member had left sitting on the edge of the stage – “this was just a convenient example.” Although her monologue wasn’t met with quite the volume of cheers that this indie-rock loving environmentalist would have liked to hear, their set sure was.

Haines and guitarist James Shaw finished the night with an acoustic performance of Combat Baby; a beautiful sing-a-long ending the night with coos of “Bye Bye Baby” and Haines reaching out to touch the hands of the lucky listeners up front. The final show on their Canadian tour, Metric’s rock-solid performance at the Orpheum showed off their “stadium loving” skill while capitalizing on the intensity behind the music.

Visit ilovemetric.com for more information about the band and to listen to a preview of Fantasies. In exchange for an email address Metric often offers free acoustic downloads on their site!

Sweating to the Music at Day Two of Virgin Festival

Under a scorching sun and with little shade to hide under, day two of Virgin Festival began with a small crowd that steadily grew to fill the hill in front of the main stage. Though uncontrollable sweating and the possibility of sunstroke threatened the listeners, the music was too good to resist, and most were just thankful there was no rain or lightening to shut things down early as it did on Saturday night.

The second day of the weekend long event at Deer Lake Park started off with a solid performance from Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros. While they may not have been well known to many of the attendees of the festival they produced a well played, entertaining set despite the small crowd.

Following Edward Sharpe were The Manvils, Carly Rae Jespen, and De La Soul. De La Soul did an excellent job of getting the crowd moving and repeating cries of “Party over here!” and encouraging even the hottest of listeners to move from the shade to a prime spot by the stage.   Also at Sunday’s show were Awesome Colour, Jarvis Cocker and Future of the Left. Followed by Sonic Youth, The Thermals, Metric, and Gomez.

Metric preformed their usual high-energy show complete with passionate dancing from lead singer Emily Haines, while they played tracks from their new album along with some of their older songs. Ben Harper & Relentless7 closed the show with a strong set backed by the sunset, though those who are used to Harper’s previous, more mellow music may have been disappointed, albeit still entertained, by his new heavier rock sound.

The bands alternated between the main stage and the smaller stage and though the lineup for the day featured some solid acts, they varied somewhat by genre. While most people likely enjoyed themselves despite this fact, there were some bands that seemed out of place. Carly Rae Jespen from Mission was one of them. Though a talented local act, the pop-country songstress seemed to throw off the listeners there for the indie-rock and hip-hop main acts.

Overall day two of Virgin Festival was a good time spent listening to talented musicians, but one is left to wonder, if Virgin can put on such a solid show, why, oh why does their local radio station (which was promoted at the event) play such a homogenous assortment of mainstream pop music?