A Great Big Pile of Leaves, The Studio at Webster Hall. October 2, 2014. Photo: Andrew Piccone
Topshelf Records’ (a DIY indie label based out of Massachusetts) label tour, as they call it, began earlier this month as many shows in New York do nowadays: with a powerful opening band killing it on stage, albeit with little reciprocation from what appears to be an audience of ‘too-cool’ kids standing motionless in place.
Field Mouse, a grungy, female-dominated synth band kicked off the night with the first cut from their most recent LP release ‘A Place You Return To In a Dream‘, building up a wall of bass-heavy, groove oriented power-pop that was relentlessly knocked down by the sweet licks of guitarist Andrew Futral and the unbreakable grooves of bassist Saysha Heinzman and drummer Tim McCoy.
Sporting matching Fender Jaguars and a Roland Juno-60 synthesizer, this band knows exactly what they want sonically, and they delivered it unheedingly. With small spouts of dry humor from frontwoman Rachel Browne, and the classic ‘middle-finger-with-the-audience’ selfie photo, they are well received – although in typical New York tough-love fashion the only response from the crowd comes after the set has finished.
Up next, New Jersey natives Prawn arrived with their sophomore LP ‘Kingfisher‘. Guitarists Tony Clark and Kyle Burns meandered their way through beautiful, winding harmonies over the background of a booming rhythm section. The theme of the night could’ve been ‘mellow, with a heavy twist’, as Prawn’s set increased in energy and power through hearty bellows from Clark, thumping bass and pounding drums. Yet all the while, Prawn never lost sight of the beautiful guitar melodies and harmonies that have helped to put them up with the likes of American Football and TTNG.
A lot of what captivates about Prawn is their execution; they make their presence known by creating breathtaking pauses before slamming back into the music with impeccable syncopated accuracy, all while flailing their guitars and bodies in sync with each other, creating quite the fine frenzy to behold on stage.
Diamond Youth, a more mellow outfit from Maryland, bring with them many unplanned tempo changes and muddy guitar tones that renderered much of their set indecipherable. Justin Gilman‘s voice is an all-too-familiar timbre, nearly identical to Muse‘s Matt Bellamy, and the guitars followed suit with a similar indie vibe to the two opening acts, yet spiced up with a dash of surf-rock. The band kept it together well, despite the sloppy time keeping of their drummer which is a tough entity to get past. Diamond Youth were not as energetic, or as well put together as their predecessors, yet the music at least was enjoyable.
Finally, the time comes for A Great Big Pile Of Leaves, who immediately set the room ablaze with their usual opener ‘Snack Attack‘. All of the energy that had been brewing inside Webster Hall erupted into a frenzy of mellow-moshing, crowd surfing, stage diving and shouting as the Leaves slayed the audience, switching between cuts from ‘You’re Always On My Mind‘ and ‘Have You Seen My Frontal Cortex?‘. Each song was executed perfectly, with a near mechanical synchronization driving each member of the well-oiled fun-machine that is AGBPOL. It was like a whole new show, with a whole new crowd, and the party was ceaseless.
All great things must come to an end, and the Leaves chose to end on a high note, encoring with ‘Vampires In Love‘. A perfect culmination to the night, the kings of mellow, yet powerful rock left the sound of a great show resonating and the first run of Topshelf’s tour a great success.
Topshelf will strike New York again with their CMJ showcase on October 24th.
(Jacob Zacharia)
Photo Andrew Piccone
