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SILVERSUN PICKUPS SETLIST Growing Old Is Getting Old
Sticks and Stones
Well Thought Out Twinkles
It Doesn't Matter Why
Panic Switch
(with Radiohead's "Airbag" intro)
Scared Together
Little Lover's So Polite
Alone on a Hill
Kissing Families
Don't Know Yet
Mean Spirits
Circadian Rhythm (Last Dance)
Dots and Dashes (Enough Already)
Substitution
Nightlight
Encore:
Three Seed
Cannibal
Empty Nest
Lazy Eye
SILVERSUN PICKUPS TOUR DATES 25 APRIL St. Louis, MO THE HAWTHORN
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Even approaching twenty-five years as a band, the Thrills aren’t gone at all-
Los Angeles alternative rock foursome Silversun Pickups returned to the area, playing The Midland Theatre in downtown Kansas City, in support of their latest record, the Butch Vig-produced Physical Thrills (via New Machine Recordings).
The evening began with a short set from relatively new Los Angeles band, Rocket, made up of childhood friends Alithea Tuttle (bass and vocals), Baron Rinzler (guitar), Cooper Ladomade (drums) and Desi Scaglione (guitar) and in support of their initial seven-track EP, Version of You, which dropped last October.
On songs like “Portrait Show” and the EP opening, “On Your Heels” the band shows some alt-rock energy with good riffs and driving choruses, but in addition to their common band name (that makes it hard to search online), there also happens to be another LA band called Rocket, this one a post-punk quintet, so something probably has to give between the two.
It was this quartet’s first time in Kansas City, who didn’t have a chance to explore the local BBQ options pre-show but did ask the crowd for suggestions (Gates and Joe’s seemed to be shouted out most), so perhaps they’ll be back with more time, but maybe also under a different name.
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The Thrills continue for Los Angeles alternative rock darlings, Silversun Pickups, make that Physical Thrills, the 2022 album that remains the band’s most recent full-length, along with a three-song companion EP, Acoustic Thrills that would come the following year. We caught the band just before that album was released, playing nearby Lawrence for the first time in some fifteen years.
And it turns out the band has more local ties than we thought--
As we noted in our preview, their recent video for "Stay Down (Way Down)" was directed by Rebekkah Drake who shared, "I decided to create this video as a fairy tale of sorts, Alice in Wonderland meets Silversun Pickups. I shot this when I went back to Kansas City last August to take care of my mom. The underwater scenes were in her backyard pool with any family member I could wrangle into working with me (thanks family)!”.
Additionally, SSP keyboardist Joe Lester’s wife is from KC and her mother and many of her family live in the area, so the Lesters are even considering getting a house in the metro, so they can split their time between here and Los Angeles. Lester proudly donned a KC hat for the show as well.
After over a year on the road and honing the newer songs, the setlist greatly differs from the 2022 (and Nov 2021 Truman appearance) version and seemed to flow better overall, beginning with the set opening, “Growing Old is Getting Old” from 2009 which seems a natural starting song, especially as the years go by.
The foursome (Brian Aubert, Nikki Monninger, Christopher Guanlao, and Joe Lester) remains as musically tight as ever, with Aubert switching guitars after almost every song, to ensure that precise tone, and the band’s penchant to play in low lighting persists (which undoubtedly sets the mood but make our visuals that much more challenging to capture).
2009’s crowd favorite “Panic Switch”, the first single from their successful second album, Swoon, is often slotted early into the set, this time adding in a nifty and familiar Radiohead intro. Aubert would reminiscence that they played the album live for the first time in Kansas City at a St. Patrick’s Day festival, joking it was a good event to debut their new music as everyone is already generally cheering and celebratory.
Bassist Monninger charmed the crowd as usual, with Aubert asking the audience to snap their fingers along to her lead on 2019’s “Don’t Know Yet” and forewarning that Nikki had been upset for weeks after the crowd in Boise didn’t keep up in proper time (...oh, Idaho!).
She shined immediately following on the rocking “Mean Spirits”, with volume rising and strobe lights flashing for the 2012 song, as the band and crowd repeated the chorus line of “I love to play and sing along.” Radio hit “Circadian Rhythm (Last Dance)” got everyone moving in tandem and the main set ended with the “We want it!” chants of 2015’s “Nightlight”.
The four-song encore began with the melancholic beauty of a 2006 deep cut, “Three Seed”, a lyrically dense song about repeating patterns and three seemingly completely different situations, almost converging onto a similar path.
“Cannibal” would follow, the lone new track from their 2014 compilation, then “Empty Nest”, a chugging mid-tempo song from the newest record, before the evening would end with the knockout punch of 2006’s “Lazy Eye”, their biggest hit with Aubert singing, “I've been waiting, I've been waiting for this moment” something the fans had been anticipating hearing live all night.
For Silversun Pickups, who approach their twenty-fifth anniversary as a band (also appropriately known as the silver anniversary), the Thrills continue, and the group shows no sign of stopping anytime soon.
Reporting and All Photos by BRANDON CLASEN
(Click on any image to enlarge and see in full)
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| JohnC ♥ johnc@weheartmusic.com ♥ X / twitter.com |
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