Well I was lucky enough to grab a GA ticket for the Muse show a couple of weeks back at the Jacques Cartier pier of the Old Port here in Montreal. Here's my evening.
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I showed up at the pier at around 5 in the afternoon, ticket in hand, as the drums and bass were being soundchecked for Starlight. In typical Montreal concert-goer fashion, there was already a line of about 150 people waiting to be admitted to the GA area. I love concert fans in this city
Things were looking overcast as we made our way into the GA area at 7, after 2 hours of sitting around on the gravel. Although cautioned not to run, I skipped/trotted up to the front to my spot about 5 rows back from centre stage. It was a great location.
The crowd was a bit demographically hilarious. It was a mix between the odd 20/30 something, stuck up junior college kids, and 15 year-old emo children with big glasses and Death Cab for Cutie t-shirts. Ah well, I elbowed them all anyway.
The Cloud Room finally came on for the first show around 8:00 and did a fairly good job. Very fun, humble musically. About half way through the set the lead singer leaned over to the mic smiling and said, "Oh, do you guys know who we are?"
"Nooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!"
"We're The Cloud Room, thanks for coming out."
"Woooooooooooooohooooooooo."
I can't say I remember any of their songs or intend to buy any merch, but Cloud Room did a good job opening and I have a general warm fuzzy recollection of their act. They played one tempo and kind of song for about ten numbers and they did it well.
Around 9:00 you could start to feel the anticipation. The sun was just about down behind a sky where the blue areas had just ominously disappeared. Suddenly at around 9:15, the entire sky opened the hell up, and with cheers and whoops from everyone in attendance we got completely and utterly soaked. It was raining like a motherfucker. The stagehands were rushing out plastic tarps, you could see sheets of rain coming off the stage scaffolding - it was a mess.
The crowd was wonderful though as we all broke into chants of 'Ole, ole ole oleee', 'We want Muse!', and the out of place but welcome 'Go Habs Go! Go Habs Go!!!'
Everyone was restless when Muse took the stage at 9:50ish, saivors of our rain-drenched evening, breaking right into Knights of Cydonia. I've seen this song at the end of the setlist before, but honestly I couldn't think of a better Muse song to open a concert. The drums were galloping along and we thousand-odd, soaking wet, sweaty folk were bouncing in unison like one of those crazy european festival crowds. Without missing a beat Muse went through Hysteria and broke into an extended, uber-sexy extended intro that dove down into the opening riff of Supermassive Black Hole after Map of the Problematique's disco-fuck.
There was a crowdsurfer or two floating around as Muse kept thundering along like some sort of robotic rock outfit from 2035, sent back in time to destroy humanity. I'm not sure if this is a good thing or not. I'm all for crazy light shows and loud noises, but I will go out on a limb to say that I felt like I could have been watching a mimed Britney Spears concert by the time they got to song ten; despite the musical talent of these three individuals.
Maybe it's the heavy, heavy, heavy reliance on backing tracks, which uncannily reminded me of seeing Keane live, but there was very little band interaction with the audience (unlike the pudgy earnest band from Battle). At the encore break I felt exhausted, but not really 'rock show exhausted'. More like 'man I just spent 90 minutes dancing at this industrial nightclub with glowsticks and I really need some water' exhausted. Despite the amazing musicianship I felt like things were on auto-pilot and this may as well be Top of the Pops.
Still, they put on one hell of a live show and if you get the chance to see them, go see them. It was a fantastic experience to see the band where they play best, in an outdoor venue with a large crowd.
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Code:
31.07.2006
Cartier Pier, Montréal, QC, Canada
1. Knights of Cydonia
2. Hysteria
3. Map of the Problematique
4. Supermassive Black Holes
5. Butterflies & Hurricanes
6. Forced In
7. Bliss
8. Sunburn
9. City of Delusion
10. Starlight
11. Invincible
12. Plug In Baby
13. Stockholm Syndrome
14. Take a Bow
15. Time is Running Out
16. New Born
)
. They're on the last page on my photo album. None with me and the band though. Originally my sister was to request to take some of me and the guys, but she got bored of waiting and left 10 minutes before they came out. Psshh. The guys didn't stay for too long, so not everyone in the crowd got to meet them or get autographs. They stayed around for about 15 minutes or so.
If only your sister could have stayed to take photos of you and the band! This is why you need to go to concerts with me.
They were good, but I think their set would have been better if it hadn't seemed as though they were just blazing through it so they could go back to their bus and go to bed.
