Show Reviews.

Friday April 20, 2007. - Montclair State University

The Montclair Fest of 2007:
Featuring Rx Bandits, Straylight Run, Houston Calls, Someday Never, To Kill the King, and Awful Waffle. I assume that Will, Jason, and a few other students were behind this.

Although I wanted to do the review for this show, I wasn’t informed that I got the ok until after it was done. So, of course with my luck, I had missed all the bands except for two. But, I really doubt anyone who would be reading this went to see anyone but Rx and A-Dub. I can toss up an educated guess for who I missed though, and if anyone wants to add to it, feel free.

I knew that the show was going to wind up being in an auditorium, but I guess my brain forgot to tell me that when auditoriums are involved, so are those obnoxious little seats. I really wasn’t a fan of having to stand in one place for The Bandits’ whole set and trying to dance, but failing miserably. But it could have been worse. I mean, I could have been squished in the aisle with a bunch of other kids while people would be stage diving and almost being dropped onto the seats every time. I’m pretty grateful that Rx didn’t want to use the fog machine during their set though. I believe it’s the most unnecessary item you could have on stage - even more unnecessary that Matt Embree’s beard. Just kidding.

Now on to the actual bands:
Awful WaffleI didn’t see them because I was still stuck on the Parkway at this time, but I’m sure it was similar to all of A-Dub’s sets. A sweet combination of songs like Straus, Cry On You, Green Beans, Jump to Conclusions, 10x Kevin Hay and a few others made for an energetic, good ol’ time like always. I’m sure that they made a lot of new fans out of the unsuspecting MSU crowd.

To Kill the King- I’ve never heard of these guys before, and since I missed them at the show, I decided to check their myspace for their music. I was unimpressed to say the least. It doesn’t even sound like these guys were really trying to do anything exciting or different. One positive I can give them is that they sound very tight and coordinated and can make something out of themselves if they try hard enough. But, its bands like these guys that have forced me to create a new genre just for them. I call it earache-core. Because that’s all it really was: metalcore and it’s most stale and redundant. This was the general consensus I got from everyone I talked to who did see them. Either make yourself stand out from other bands or jump off the trend while you still can fellas.

Someday Never- While I have heard of this band, I never actually heard them before. And since I missed them too, I checked out their myspace page as well for the low-down. I would have liked to have seen these guys, because I liked what heard on their page. In a nutshell, Someday Never is a pop-punk band with a few harder edges and a few decent hooks as well. I doubt anyone was really into them when they played though and that’s a shame.

Houston Calls- One of my friends at school is really into these guys and when I told him that I would be seeing them on 4/20, he flipped a shit because he couldn’t make it. I told him I’d let him know how they were, and I was lucky enough to have finally gotten in when they were playing. They’re pretty similar to Someday Never in terms of poppiness, but their differences lead me to like them more. It’s the standard setup really: A pop-punk band with a high-pitched singer and plenty of hooks to dig into you that by the time they’re done playing you’ll be singing their songs for days on end. They’ve also got a keyboard player (who for a few minutes a thought was Steve Choi, but upon closer inspection I was happily wrong.) to round out a sound that without him, could become pretty dull pretty fast. It was a pretty entertaining set, they certainly sounded like they knew what they were doing and the crowd was into them as well. Ov erall, not a bad band at all. I also thought their merch was pretty creative and had a good sense of humor put into it.

Straylight Run-Heard of this band as well, but never listened to them. I watched them for a few minutes, but was so pumped for Rx that I didn’t want to watch them anymore. They’re certainly a really talented band that can work a crowd, but I’m not really into the whole indie-pop experimental thing, so I was turned off. But if that’s your thing, (along with chick singers) then by all means check them out because they’re definitely going in a positive direction.

Rx Bandits- Umm...holy shit? Yeah, I think that works. The bandits were simply amazing as always. Great song selection, they pretty much played everything I expected them to. In Her Drawer, Battle Begun, Decrescendo, Only For the Night, Sell You Beautiful, and so many others had everyone in sight going fucking nuts despite the cramped conditions. I was also glad that they snuck in at least one song off of Progress. I think there are a few songs on that record better than Consequential Apathy, but it works for me. And oh man, Mastering the List! Hell yeah. That whole set was a good time. I was a little irritated at the jamming that was going on between songs just because of how often it was happening, but I understand that on-stage banter is not their strong point. I also got a kick out of how that they actually had no intention of encoring, but since the house lights weren’t lit up, and the music wasn’t playing, everyone still t hought they would come back. I had no idea what they would even play because I thought they already went through all their songs they still do in their main set. But they did a good job with Prophetic and Crushing Destroyer to close the deal.

Overall, this show gets an “A-” mostly because of the venue itself disturbing the flow of the crowd. Also, even though I know a big chunk of the crowd didn’t care for the openers, they all did pretty well for themselves and deserve as much accolades as the Rx Bandits.

~Allon.