The Walkmen/Hot Hot Heat/Apollo Sunshine

live in San Francisco (2003)

Nick

I got to this show somewhat early and surprisingly enough Bottom of the Hill opened their doors about 10 minutes before it said they were going to on their website. Having stuff like that happen always puts me in a good mood. My friend had to take some photos of The Walkmen before the show and I got to meet a couple of the guys from the band. Once my friend got taking photos of them we went back inside the venue. Apollo Sunshine was doing a sound check and were sounding really good. I was somewhat surprised because what I had heard online didn't really do much for me, so I was glad that they sounded so good.

Apollo Sunshine opened up the show at around 9:40pm, which was approximately 40 minutes after the show was supposed to start. These guys are from Boston, Ma and flew out to LA for business and got added to a couple shows while they are out here. I am pretty surprised, but these guys are still unsigned but I don't think it will last for much longer. The guitarist does plenty of guitar kicks while the bassist sports a mean fu man chu mustache, plays keyboard and sings as well. They also used a good amount of slide guitar during their set, which I really liked and was done very good. Some of the songs they played during their set were "Fear of Heights", "The Egg", "I Was on The Moon", "Blood is Wood", "Sheets with Stars", and the final song for the night for them was "Mayday Disorder". Keep an eye out for these guys for sure.

Everyone's favorite Canadians, Hot Hot Heat were up next. They had played an in store concert earlier at Amoeba Records in San Francisco and said playing tonight was better since they weren't hung over. Fresh off them signing to Warner Brother's Records didn't hurt since some of the guys were sporting some new shoes and plenty nice clothes. Once they started their set, the dancing didn't stop until the final song they played. These guys were a pretty fun band with Steve(singer) walking around on stage singing to the crowd and going back to the keyboard while singing. Some of the songs they played off their EP, "Knock Knock Knock" were "5 Times Out of 100", "More For Show", and "Touch You Touch You". The songs that I noticed they played from their latest album "Make Up the Break Down" were, "No, Not Now", and "Get In or Get Out". Steve said they had one song left and this is a dialog between my friend and I:
Me: "Do you think this song is going to be Bandages?"
My Friend: "*Shrug* I don't know."
Steve: "This last song is called Bandages."
So Hot Hot Heat finished up Bandages and were done for the night.

The closers for the night were The Walkmen who you might know from their song in the latest Saturn car commercial called "We've Been Had". They put out their latest album on Star Time Records also home to French Kicks and Brendan Benson. New to their setup for tonight's show was a piano that they had just gotten. I don't think they even had it at their show last night which was at the same venue as tonight. The lights lowered and The Walkmen took the stage. The guys were all dressed nice and wearing some sport coats. Their drummer was pretty amazing, from the moment they started up he was drumming like crazy and was baffled that he didn't pass out from wearing such warm clothes in there. I really don't know much from this band other than the songs they have on their website and on their label's website, but they really amazed me. Standing there listening to the music can make you almost lost in how much sound there is involved. A couple other songs they played for the night were "Wake Up" and "Revenge Wears No Wristwatch". To end the night they play a couple songs for their encore and were done for the evening. This was their 1st time to the West Coast and I hope it won't be their last.