The Digitalism concert last night at Engine Room was one of my worst concert experiences ever. And it was not all because of Digitalism. This was 85% Engine Room’s fault for a couple of reasons. First off, according to the tickets the show was supposed to start at 8:00pm but I guess this was more of a suggestion because, after a lengthy “sound check”, the doors were not opened until 9:40. I got my wristband then sped home so I could drink before Digitalism came on (I live about 6 minutes from downtown). I get back about 10 minutes before Digitalism starts their performance a full 3 hours late around 11:00. When the show starts, about 10 kids hop on some speakers that were placed directly in front of the stage, blocking the view for the rest of the crowd, dancing, and twirling shirts around as if the rest of the crowd and me had paid 12 dollars to see their live rendition of High School Musical: Scenester Edition. The truly amazing thing is that no one from Engine Room came to get these kids off the speakers at any point during the whole show. The most the crowd could do was hurl profanities, empty cups or ice, but nothing got these kids out of the way (at least they were persistent with their pestery). I'm not letting Digitalism off the hook either, they had their part in this debacle too. Their live performance just wasn’t that good. I love their album but I realize now that “solid” is a synonym for “flat”. The album is pretty even throughout, there aren’t many variations and no big finale. This showed in the performance, the most high energy song they played was Home Zone and they didn’t have a strong song to end on. They kept it short but not so sweet, playing most of the songs the way they were on the album. The whole thing was over in little over an hour. In contrast, Justice had numerous remixes of their tracks to pull from and extended 5 minute songs to 7-8 minutes songs during their live performance last week in Austin. I get another chance to see Digitalism on Saturday in Austin, hopefully in between now and then they will learn the art of the extended dance break.
By the Numbers
3 – Drinks spilled on me in an hour
5 – Price of cheapest mixed drink
10 – Punk ass kids on stage the whole show
15% - Percentage of blame allocated to Digitalism
85% - Percentage of blame allocated to the Engine Room
By the Numbers
3 – Drinks spilled on me in an hour
5 – Price of cheapest mixed drink
10 – Punk ass kids on stage the whole show
15% - Percentage of blame allocated to Digitalism
85% - Percentage of blame allocated to the Engine Room
1 comment:
lol what a sad looking venue. that looks like it could be in someone's living room. i don't think i would have been able to enjoy a show in there either.
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