I'm wearing my t-shirt that I got at the concert but you can't see it in the picture. I was so happy to get a concert shirt because they didn't have a merchandise booth when we saw them last time in Dallas.
The Darkness is one of my top three favorite bands of all time; the other two are Goo Goo Dolls and Weezer, and Wes doesn't really like either of them but he does like The Darkness so when they tour anywhere near Oklahoma, we gotta go see them! New Orleans isn't exactly near Oklahoma but whatever. The concert took place at the Civic Theatre, a small intimate venue. Wes got us floor tickets so we got to be up close and personal. Speaking of up close and personal, we saw the lead singer, Justin Hawkins, coming out of his tour bus and into the venue. We saw his front side but he had already turned toward the door by the time I got my phone/camera out.
My chance at being a paparazzi... its Justin Hawkins!!
Diarrhea Planet
The opening band was Diarrhea Planet. The lead singer more screamed than sung their lyrics so I have no idea what their songs were about. But I still liked them. Wes claimed that their problem was that they had too many guitarists and only one of them could really play. LOL There were four guitarists, one bassist and a drummer. They were loud and fast and reminded me of the bands I grew up on (think late 1990's and early 2000's alternative college rock scene). The night of the concert was the bassist's son's birthday so we all sung Happy Birthday to him while he recorded it on Facebook Live. I would have been supportive and bought an EP but their merchandise booth only accepted cash and I used all of mine on my The Darkness t-shirt. *sad face*
The name of The Darkenss' tour was Tour De Prance and they surely did a lot of prancing and dancing! They are a every entertaining band and you can see how much they love performing. Definitely one of those bands that you have to see live. My absolute favorite song by them, Love is Only a Feeling, is part of their regular set list so that's always my favorite part of their shows. They played every song off their first album, Permission to Land, and scattered in a good variety of songs from all of their other albums as well. Besides doing a terrific job at playing music, they also did a really good job of interacting with the audience. The lead singer chatted with us throughout the show, attempted throwing guitar picks into the chandelier, did some headstands on the drum set riser, and improvised a little bit of jazz in honor of Louisiana's jazz scene. We also had several sing-alongs.
The Darkness came out to perform! After their first song, the lead singer looked out at us and noticed there were significantly fewer of us than he had expected. He explained that their marketing personnel informed him that they had sold out the theater but instead, there were only about 370 of us present. (I'm not sure how he counted us all so quickly.) He blamed it on the Jazz Festival that was going on that same weekend. LOL He seemed only mildly upset but quickly put that aside and did their best to entertain us as if it was a sold out arena. I think they put on a better performance because there were so few of us and they really tried their best to give us a good show. They even came out for an encore! At the end of the show, they distributed everything -- guitar picks, drum sticks, set lists, articles of clothing-- into the audience. Sadly, I didn't catch any of it. Wes and I saw them on their last tour at The House of Blues in Dallas, which was a sold out show, and I think they did better at this tiny venue. This concert was the last of our events in New Orleans. I think it was the perfect way to end our vacation. Good bye, NOLA, you were great!
No comments:
Post a Comment