Arcade Fire, Greek Theatre, Berkeley, CA 10/3/10

I have to travel to the Bay Area once a week because I've been interning at a post-production house in San Francisco. Today on the drive down I listened to pretty much nothing but Arcade Fire, trying to remember the amazing performance that happened the night before. Nowadays, I would just tweet a bunch about stuff, but I felt compelled to blog this one. I had a lot of things on my mind I guess.

-One of the best parts of the evening was the double dip of Regine Chassagne songs. Really early into the set they did "Haiti" and "Sprawl II". I didn't think I would hear "Haiti" live, so when they started playing it I may have freaked out a bit. My squeals of joy were hopefully drowned out by the crowd. Another nice surprise was "Ocean of Noise."

-This was my first concert in a year. I went to one show last year which was the second day of the Treasure Island Music Festival when The Flaming Lips headlined. I also saw The Decemberists and Beirut that day but it wasn't that memorable. Mainly because although I love Beirut, I can't listen to them for long periods of time because they make me sleepy. The Decemberists, who I really love, only performed The Hazards of Love beginning to end. I don't really like it when bands do that. Perform one album. It's kind of lame. The Flaming Lips were awesome. Seeing them live is quite an experience, but I don't consider them one of my favorite favorite bands. I knew the words to the songs, and I was dancing and jumping but I don't know. They're right outside the top ten or something for me. The whole reason for me explaining this was because last night's Arcade Fire show was the first time since probably going to concerts in Chicago, that I felt that really amazing feeling of just giving personal energy to the band performing and getting an equal amount of energy back. Being in the presence of a band that you love and seeing them give an amazing performance is one of the best feelings you can experience, in my opinion.

-They didn't play "My Body is a Cage." I didn't even think about that song until I heard it tonight. Now I feel disappointed. Only a little.

-Despite what you may think about "Wake Up," like maybe you think it's played out, or you might not even be familiar with the song, I implore everyone to go to an Arcade Fire show just to hear that song live. It is the ultimate sing-along and dance-along at the end when it gets upbeat. It was an amazing sight to see.

-I noticed that the crowd response for "Month of May" was kind of low. It's not my favorite song on "The Suburbs," and I don't know if I'm part of the majority when it comes to that song. They keep playing that song when they perform though, so I don't know. Funny story though, I was standing next to a girl with her arms folded tight. I wanted to wail in her ear, "HOW YOU GONNA LIFT IF WITH YOUR ARMS FOLDED TIGHT? TELL ME!"

-Poor Will Butler! He ate it hard while running around during "Rebellion." He was playing a drum(maybe a tom?) and he was just running around like a wild man, and he slipped. He quickly got up though. Probably had a lot of adrenaline going inside of him but it looked like it totally hurt.

Based on my enjoyment factor of last night's performance, I can comfortably put Arcade Fire near the top of my all time favorite bands. It's been an interesting journey for Arcade Fire and me. I was one of the few people that didn't really like "Funeral" at first. Besides "Rebellion," I just didn't enjoy it for whatever reason. When "Neon Bible" came out though, I was like "Oh, this is pretty cool." I think because it's probably their most depressing album is what attracted me to it. This year, "The Suburbs" came out, and my album of the year list now reads like this:

1. "The Suburbs" - Arcade Fire

2-100. Don't know yet. "The Bridge" by DLRN is somewhere in there. "Teen Dream" by Beach House. Everything else is a question mark.