Death Cab For Cutie w/ Bright Eyes - Live in Calgary

Anita and I went to the Death Cab for Cutie show this past week in Calgary, almost 5 years to the day we first saw them together locally. That was our first concert date, shortly after we'd just started seeing each other, and I have vivid memories of the intense feelings of euphoria we experienced that first time Ben Gibbard and co. made sweet love to our ears with his melodic voice, emotionally charged lyrics, and live act that amazingly managed to match, if not outdo, all the different nuances and richness to their recorded work. So here we are, 5 years later, 5 years older, but the crowd around us largely hadn't changed. They were still the 15 - 25 year olds, and WE were now the elder statesmen, minus the one old dude beside us, who appeared to be chaperoning his two kids. At least we weren't THAT old. But as it turns out, that 'old' dude had made his way to Coachella recently specifically to see Bright Eyes, and so Anita and I didn't feel like we were young by comparison anymore. :(

I won't go into a full blown review of the show, as there are far more qualified folks that could do that. All I will say is that the set list spanned a really nice range of their discography, and I may have peed my pants a little when they played the first few bars of "Movie Script Ending". Oh, and the way the drummer POUNDED his drums to the ending of their encore set closing "Transatlanticism" was one of the most visceral images I've seen in a long, long time. Absolutely sonically and visually mesmerizing.

And I guess I should also mention that Bright Eyes opened the show with a really good set as well. I (echoing almost every other girl in the crowd) screamed like a schoolgirl when Connor played the first couple notes to "Lover I Don't Have to Love". Okay, gotta go. Enjoy. And check out both bands if you're aren't familiar with their work. Youtube is your friend.

Enough rambling, on with the images. All shot with the Leica D-Lux 4 point and shoot, including the 720p video of "I Will Follow You Into The Dark" at the end of this post (if you're reading this on facebook, you may have to hit 'View Original Post' to see the video).











Ben gave a bit of a spiel about how he hates it when bands insert names of cities into their songs... that is, until they actually have the chance to play those songs in the named city. In this case, the crowd goes a bit nuts as expected when he does a solo of "I Will Follow You Into The Dark."