Bear Hands, The Lonely Forest, and We Were Promised Jetpacks
Posted by Jon OlkenTo See Rating: 7.1
Just Curious Rating: 6.9
Last Tuesday, a great group of bands sold out Neumos. Anyone lucky enough to make it through the door, and there were a number of fans trying to find tickets who weren’t lucky enough, were treated to a fantastic show by Bear Hands, The Lonely Forest, and We Were Promised Jetpacks.
The first band to hit the stage was the Brooklyn based Bear Hands. After playing a live set on KEXP earlier in the day, a lot of folks were excited to see them and made it in early to check them out, myself included. We were not disappointed. They were easily the loudest band of the night. Rocking the crowd with their riotous percussion segments, featuring several of the band members playing various drums, and soaring guitar and bass riffs. They’re set was a great primer for what was to come later. They are definitely a band to keep your eyes on in the future. Sorry the following video isn’t from Neumos.
The second band of the night was local boys The Lonely Forest. The Anacortes based band, led by John Van Deusen, has been creating quite a buzz in the local music scene over the past couple of years, so I was eager to see them live. Their set was interesting as it was filled with mostly new material from their soon to be released major label debut. It was still the piano driven pop that’s expected from them, but it was, in my humble opinion, somewhat lacking. It reminded me of Dashboard Confessional but with more piano. It was still a good show, but I can see now why Eric Grandy says that they are destined for Twilight soundtracks.
The Lonely Forest Myspace page
The headliner of the evening was We Were Promised Jetpacks. The four Scottish rockers have been making music since 2003, when they won their schools battle of the bands competition, but their debut album, These Four Walls, was only released in June of last year. This is their first North American tour as a headliner. Last year when they visited Seattle, they were the opener for fellow Scottish rockers Frightened Rabbit. This time they were the main act, and they showed the packed house at Neumos that they deserve top billing.
The band entered on stage to a prerecorded and kind of weird launch sequence. They played along with the weirdness until the launch sequence stopped and they took off into their song “Keeping Warm.” They followed that by going straight into the popular and fast paced rock song “Quiet Little Voices.” From the get go, We Were Promised Jetpacks had the crowd bouncing along to their lively rock songs. It wasn’t entirely fast paced though. They slowed down the mood and picked it up often in the same song. It set a nice pace for the show as they tore through their repertoire.
For most of the show, the crowd screamed, jumped, danced, and stared as We Were Promised Jetpacks rocked our worlds. At times, lead singer Adam Thompson didn’t even use his microphone. He just knocked his microphone stand over and screamed the lyrics while the crowd sang along. The band was enjoying themselves so much that they decided to skip the formality of leaving the stage before the encore, telling the audience that just wanted to keep playing. Unfortunately, they couldn’t play all night, and they ended their set with the epic song “Short Burts.”
It was a phenomenal performance by We Were Promised Jetpacks. It was a treat to see such a humble band, they thanked everyone from the venue and the fans to their own mothers, rock so hard. The opening bands were a pleasure as well. All things said and done, it was one heck of a Tuesday night.
