Something about the words “Fust Live” doesn’t quite scream video arcade.
That’s what happened in Salt Lake City, though. Wednesday was my first step inside Salt Lake’s Quarters Arcade Bar. Not to play Ms. Pac Man but to see Fust and Merce Lemon on their co-headlining national tour. More later on my Child of the 80’s review of the arcade itself. Let’s focus first, as we should, on the music.
Click for my review and pics of the Fust show!!
The Beths Salt Lake City show warmed a pre-holiday crowd with a mix of power pop favorites. The Beths, featuring Liz Stokes, are touring on their hit August album Straight Line Was a Lie. Stokes and company are touring the U.S., Japan and Australia through next summer. And after four albums, The Beths shared an easy rapport with the packed house at Salt Lake City’s Metro Music Hall.
Keep reading for a touching moment in The Beths show
The Elbow Salt Lake City show at the Union Events Center this month marked the Brits’ return to Utah after an absence of 17 years. Holy cats, how could it have been so long. The band played from 2024’s well received Audio Vertigo, one of my favorite records of 2024. They also played from this year’s follow-up EP, Audio Vertigo Echo, and from their Mercury Music prize-winning The Seldom Seen Kid and songs from four other albums.
Click to read about Elbow’s best two songs that night
The Big Thief Salt Lake City show on September 22, the third in their US tour for Double Infinity, treated the audience to an hour and 40 minutes of hits from past to present. It also included a rollicking new song I am dying to hear again.
Yes it took a month for show deets and photos, but here they are!
Keep reading for the albums Big Thief played from
Pom Poko live were sooo much louder, weirder and ecstatic in person than I imagined. I loved it. The Oslo math punks played last Wednesday at Salt Lake’s Kilby Court venue to maybe 80 people. Those in attendance will someday be able to tell their grandkids, I saw Pom Poko play in a converted garage shed in front of a few dozen people before they broke out at Wembley Stadium. Here is what they played.
Keep reading for Pom Poko highlights and more photos
How many times did I see the Son Volt Trace tour in 1995 and 1996?! Probably five or six times…some of the most memorable shows of my young life.
And in 2023, after eleven studio albums, Son Volt announced an anniversary tour for 1995’s Trace (the completely logical 28th anniversary). It would land them in Salt Lake City on September 27. While they were also performing from their excellent Day of the Doug tribute to Doug Sahm…let’s be honest, we were there to hear Trace. This is what happened that night.
Keep reading for Top Son Volt songs that night and show photos
I neglected to post about the Charles Wesley Godwin concert in Salt Lake City more than a month ago at SLC’s The Depot. It hasn’t been for wont of enthusiasm: I was looking forward to seeing the leading man of the West Virginia Mafia taking over alt country, and he delivered in every way.
I came into the Charles Wesley Godwin concert at a disadvantage: I hadn’t previewed the singles from his upcoming Family Ties album, which came out in September.
The truth is, I’m a little late to the CWG party generally, and came to see Morgantown’s favorite son based more on reputation. He has become known for upstaging Zach Bryan as Bryan’s opener early in the year, giving a motivational speech to the Mountaineer football team this fall and emerging as the leader of the emerging West Virginia scene. Side note: Godwin entered school hoping to play football as a Mountaineer but fell back on music. We are lucky all fortunate for his career decision!
This is what happened at the Godwin show that night.
Keep reading for Godwin’s top moments, video and an insane photo
The 100 Gecs hype machine pulled into Utah April 12. While I can recommend their 2023 release 10,000 Gecs without reservation, the 100 Gecs Salt Lake City Show was a total bore.
Here’s what you didn’t miss.
It was a promising beginning for the 100 Gecs Salt Lake City Show. Like on the album open, Dylan Brady and Laura Les roll onto stage with the THX sound logo deep enough to make most of the teen boys in the audience sterile. It’s a kickin’ statement, though, and they launched immediately into album opener “Dumbest Girl in the World.” Dylan in his trademark yellow wizard cloak and hat and Laura in a her less-wizardly T-shirt and jeans.
The Gecs rolled through several other anthemic crowd-favorites like “Hollywood Baby,” “Doritos & Fritos,” “One Million Dollars” and “I Got My Tooth Removed.” The band also dipped into debut 1,000 Gecs with “Stupid Horse,” “Hand Crushed by a Mallet” and “ringtone.” Here’s the studio version of “ringtone.”
Honestly hearing both albums side-by-side, the the nu metal dorkiness of 100 Gecs sophomore album is a real improvement from the endless autotune of their debut.
Dylan and Les DJ nearly their entire show.
I guess that’s fine if the compositions are impractical to tour or the artist really wants to be in the moment. But if you’re going to DJ your show you better Beastie Boys the freaking stage. The 100 Gecs show was oddly static. They NEEDED instruments — anything — to occupy them. Dylan, in particular, was very nearly idle.
Unfortunately after a half hour when someone finally handed Laura Les a guitar, the crawling and self-absorbed solo brought the show to a crashing halt.
Laura intro’d most of the songs and a couple of these were cute: “This is a song about a frog. And a floor. The song is called ‘Frog on the Floor.'” Amusing enough.
However she was also responsible for most of the inane stage banter which consisted of at least three, “SLC, how are we doin’?!!?!!” It was real Spinal Tap energy, but not ironically.
Was I intensely self-aware of my age watching this all play out, behind at least three wizard-capped 14-year-olds? Yes, yes I was. But I usually am that self-conscious and I can compartmentalize with the best of them to enjoy a show.
I expected loud, dumb fun but not boredom. This night, the Gecs were dreck. I walked out after about 50 minutes.
Four words: Just buy the album.
When I returned home to the South earlier this month, Arlo Mckinley’s third album This Mess We’re In was one of my soundtracks as I wound my way through old haunts and fond memories. Seeing Mckinley at SLC’s Urban Lounge was like a brief reunion with my peoples.
Also he brought down some serious country jams.
Not only was this Arlo’s first time stopping in Zion, he told the crowd it was his first voyage west of the Colorado River. And he made every minute of it. Mckinley’s music is alt country without the alt; I hate to say southern rock because that sounds so Marshall Tucker Band-y, but it’s honestly not an INAPPROPRIATE label. Arlo absolutely has a Lynyrd Skynyrd thing going, and it’s amaze.
McKinley’s ballads are good but he is strongest when the band opens up and tears into the rock riffs. He brings all the guns: four guitars, including a pedal steel and slide guitar. When the pedal kicked in on opener “We Were Alright” from 2020’s Die Western, it was positively divine.
As the show started, Mckinley looked every bit a 200 South busker in a knit cap and hoodie, which he gradually shed to maintain body temperature. He played for fully 90 minutes on Wednesday. At times the show was tight and practiced, at other times oddly raw with elongated pauses between songs while fumbling with equipment and tuning guitars. He is sweet in his absence of guile, making ribald jokes and explaining to the audience this was his last song, “unless you make me play more. I guess that’s up to you.” It was an older, more subdued audience but they got him out for an encore.
Alvvays in Salt Lake City played a bang-up show Tuesday. Toronto’s rising stars played songs from their 2014 self-titled debut and more…
Besides “We Were Alright,” highlights from his current album included “I Wish I” and “To Die For.” He also performed a bluesy, whiskey-soaked cover of Sinéad’s “Nothing Compares 2 U” and John Prine’s “Storm Windows.” The band gradually abandoned Arlo later in the show for several solo numbers then rejoined him for closer “To Die For.”
Thanks to his prompting, the crowd was able to coax him back onstage for two encores. This included the night’s highlight, a barnstorming eight-minute version of “Rushintherug.” It really showed off the power of the four guitar front including a blistering slide guitar solo and welcome graduation of driving percussion. Absolutely the top song performance I’ve seen all year. 5/5 stars would recommend.
Here is the studio version of “Rushintherug.”
If the audience was more subdued, it wasn’t hesitant to buy shots for Arlo and he wasn’t hesitant to oblige. After an hour and a half of drinking, playing and singing, Mckinley still spent time after the show shaking hands with fans and taking group photos. It really was sweet. It’s not every night you see someone willing to set aside the rock god persona to share laughs and hugs with the audience one on one.
Maybe it was my Southern bias, but I was smitten by his innocence. Look — I spend so much money on music, I NEVER buy merch. But it was Arlo’s first trip out West and I wanted to help pay for his trip home. So I bought an overpriced t-shirt, and you can too right here. Buy a shirt or a lid, definitely download This Mess We’re In and support an American original. Arlo’s upcoming tour dates after some photos.
Alvvays in Salt Lake City played a bang-up show Tuesday. Toronto’s rising stars played songs from their 2014 self-titled debut and more heavily from 2017’s Anti-Socialites and their acclaimed Blue Rev, released less than two weeks ago. The supremely assured performance is everything fans both old and new at SLC’s The Depot could have wanted.
First, Molly Rankin looked every bit a college graduate student in black pants, a short-sleeve top and the the piercing, blue eyes of Siberian Husky. She confidently belted out 70 minutes of Alvvays’ best arrangements Tuesday. Rankin alternated the spotlight at times with guitarist Alec O’Hanley, who orchestrated the shoegaze overtones on “Pharmacist” and a couple of RAWK GOD breakouts, notably the showstopper bridge on “Many Mirrors.” The hour plus set was tight and confident, the sound of a band come into its own.
Its funny reading around to see how Alvvays is described, with very little agreement. Fuzzy guitars, yes. A bit of surf, sure. Dream pop, I gueessss. But Alvvays is also one of those bands that gets crunchier live, which is exactly what I love. At the same time, Rankin on stage still digs into the pathos and emotion of “Easy On Your Own,” “Party Police” and “Belinda Says.”
Second, a note about how Alvvays defies convention. At times Tuesday they dabbled in a bit of psychedelia, demonstrated their new range in electronics on “Very Online Guy” and showed off the sheer bubblegum delight of “Adult Diversions.” Here is that 2014 studio version:
Critically, Alvvays possess the intangible and truly priceless gift of woah-woah lyrics, exquisitely on display Tuesday on songs like “Undertow” from Anti-Socialites. At times, Alvvays wrapped their live songs in a punky, perfectly curt dead stop. At other times, they indulged in an atmospheric, languid jam that still held the crowd’s rapt attention as on the delightful extended end to “Tom Verlaine.”
Wet Leg played an abbreviated, at times joyous and thumping show at The Depot…
Finally, the standouts on Tuesday included not just current singles, “Earthquake” and “Easy On Your Own,” but perhaps inevitably their signature “Archie, Marry Me” from Alvvays’ debut. It carried no less punch, no less pleading, no less an exquisite picture of young love.
During the summer, take me sailing out on the Atlantic.
I won’t set my sights on other seas, there is no need to panic.
So honey take me by the hand and we can sign some papers.
Forget the invitations, floral arrangements and bread makers.
Hey, hey, marry me, Archie
Hey, hey, marry me, Archie
Buy your copy of Blue Rev and some Alvvays merch from Polyvinyl. Photos of Tuesday’s show follow + tour dates as Alvvays in Salt Lake City moves further west.
