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The Arcade Fire plays Variety Playhouse
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
The opening act Wednesday at Variety Playhouse was a good-natured singer/violinist who performed under the name Final Fantasy. Near the end of his set, he thanked the crowd for showing up in time to hear him since they had all really come to see headliners The Arcade Fire.
“We’re here for you,” someone in the audience shouted, in a showing of moral support.
“Well,” Mr. Fantasy said, “you guys are stupid or something. Have you heard The Arcade Fire? Are you aware of what they sound like?”
Oh yes. We were aware.
The Arcade Fire only has one full-length album, 2004’s wildly acclaimed “Funeral,” but the band’s momentum is serious enough that Wednesday’s show was sold-out well in advance.
It deserved to be. With seven people on stage, the Montreal post-punk collective summoned a jagged roar that sounded at once like a circus attraction and a symphony.
This was a band untroubled by ego or convention. The members swapped instruments and stage positions througout the night, trading lead vocalists, alternating between English and French lyrics, and occasionally yelling in a wonderfully ragged seven-part harmony.
It seemed childlike but not childish, the work of a young band that clearly still appreciates the thrill of creation.
One member, a reedy and bespectacled redhead named Richard Reed Parry, played so many instruments it was hard to keep track. The list included the electric bass, keyboard, accordion, a single drum and a tambourine. Late in the set, he used a drumstick to beat a motorcycle helmet.
The band’s material ranged from an ethereal ballad about riding in the backseat of a car to a knockout rocker about losing power in an ice storm.
After awhile, it became clear that The Arcade Fire’s biggest asset is its dimension. Some perfectly good bands — like, say, The Strokes — get by doing one thing well. But with its wild instrumentation, its distinct singers and its odd songforms, The Arcade Fire has the unusual capacity to surprise and stimulate the listener in a more complete way. This band tickles the entire ear.
Near the end of the show, during the ice storm song “Power Out,” the two onstage violinists (including Final Fantasy) made a sound like a jet engine taking off. The noise worked in context with the song’s surging melody, and it also seemed like an apt metaphor for the trajectory of this strange and wonderful new band.
Check out photos from The Arcade Fire sold out performance.
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