Sunday, July 13, 2008

7/12/08 - Calhoun, Smile Smile

went to the barley house on saturday night to catch the greatness of one of my absolute favorite local bands - Calhoun.


finally had some company - batman and wifey, the Les Savy Fan, and Joe the Boy Toy all showed up, although half-way thru Smile Smile's set, the LSF just had to leave to go join his gun-show-flaunting, oh-so-ironic-t-shirt-wearing, faux-hawk-sporting buddies down on lower greenville to "mix and mingle", as he put it. i'm sure he was a good boy.


big crowd at the barley house. many frat-boy douches, yes, but that was more than made up for by all of the amazing sun-dress-wearing sorority gals. oh my. also had the pleasure of watching Manya of blue petal dance her drunken ass off. veerry entertaining.


amazing sound system, too, btw. definitely been upgraded since the last time i was there.


up first was Smile Smile, who I've seen 3-4 times, and who seem to be blowing up right now. 3-man band: Ryan on guitar, Jencey on keys, and drummer (sorry, dude). it's always very nice - some songs happy, some sad, some country-tinged, some pure pop. Ryan's voice can get a tad reedy sometimes, but thankfully it gets smoothed over by Jencey's beautiful harmonies. anyways, they played a nice (if a bit long) set.

next up was Calhoun, and i cannot say enough good things about these guys. there's no doubt that they'll be huge one day, and i'll be proud to say 'i knew them when'. my gawd, if these guys can't make it big, i don't know who can. every song, a pure joy to behold. i was just blown away (happens every time i hear them). at one point, they were joined by Jencey doin some beautiful harmonies - talk about a dream team. they definitely are the masters of the start-out-quiet-and-pretty, then-kick-into-anthemic, wall-of-sound, kick-your-ass rock. one thing i really noticed last night - tim can fucking wail on that guitar. they did all the old songs i love, plus a bunch of new stuff too, which was fantastic. their new album comes out September 9. can't wait.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hate that I missed Calhoun, but sometimes sacrifices have to be made in the name of drunken hijinks.

Anonymous said...

Stumbled onto your blog after looking for pics from the Smile Smile show Saturday night. Enjoyed what you had to say. It was a great night of music. Two of the best bands Dallas/Ft Worth has to offer. I agree with what you said about Smile Smile's set possibly being a bit long. If it's any consolation I was standing by the sound guy and he kept asking them to "play one more". I think the band wanted to be done way before they actually were. Regardless, enjoyed your blog. It was a great night.

Steve M said...

hey, thanks for the comments. 'preciate that.