Last night the Paste staff and our fantastic designers at Metaleap Design went to see The Arcade Fire take over the Atlanta Civic Center. I acted as a Ticketmaster window, collecting all the orders and arranging seating for the Paste extended family (48 in all), so I’ve appointed myself official blogger for this show…
It’s no surprise that today’s water cooler conversation was the amazing show… but since we don’t have a water cooler, we took our chat online. Here’s a transcript of the conversation/review of the show/random thoughts from the Paste team.
The Arcade Fire Chat
Words by: Austin, Brian, Caren, Jason, Kate, Mark, Matthew, Reid, Val
Photos by: Christiano Prado
Caren: Arcade Fire. Discuss.
Kate: the arcade fire is so goth
Caren: Favorite songs?
Reid: Neighborhood #1 (Tunnels) made me cry
Val: me too
Kate: you both seriously cried?
Reid: It really became part of my life for awhile—got all wrapped up in the emotions tied to that.
Austin: I cried just now thinking about you guys crying
Caren: It made me cry when I heard the mash-up of Tunnels and My Humps, called “Hump My Tunnels”
Jason: your tear ducts were the tunnels through which the sorrow journeyed
Reid: (hey I’m being serious here!)
Caren: We’ll get back to serious soon.
Brian: that’s the song i listened to on my way to my interview with Tim at Paste back in 04
Caren: Tunnels was?
Brian: Yes.
Val: watching Richard Reed Perry and Win Butler go insane with that cymbal stand during Laika was incredible. I had a lump in my throat.
Mark: the power’s out-rebellion combo was pretty great
Reid: The thing José and I were saying stuck with me—the show ended on such an emotional high that if Win Butler had said “now let’s go overthrow the city,” 4,000 people might have stormed out to do so.
Kate: It was a pretty joyful night.
Val: I was amazed when Win actually called people down to the front
Matthew: Yeah, the show didn’t quite feel right until he called everyone down. Something was missing until then.
Val: that’s when it felt like an Arcade Fire show
Reid: you could just see the panic on the faces of the security staff
Caren: the security guard told me i couldn’t go down there… but i said “Win Butler said I could!” she asked, “Who’s Win Butler?”
Reid: in the hierarchy of authority, Win Butler > security guard
Jason: there was definitely a spiritual fervor in the place, which felt appropriate since there was a huge portable pipe organ onstage and a video of some crazy woman evangelist that opened the show before the band walked out
Mark: yeah. the “holy ghost enema” video was special.
Brian: they didn’t bring the neon bible
Reid: only projections of it.
Austin: the band certainly has a vibe that’s more epic than real life sometimes
Reid: it was sorta the whole Arcade Fire vibe in a nutshell: exceedingly serious stuff wrapped up in this “let’s sing our lungs out to overcome it” beyond-joyful thing
Jason: and Regine dances like she’s in a music video from 1985, in a good way
Caren: And Regine is RIPPED! Wow!
Reid: I credit the drum-playing. banging the kit for, what, four songs?
Val: she’s great behind the kit
Austin: did she bench press anything?
Kate: i’m glad we’re calling it the kit guys
Jason: I told Brian that Regine looked like she was wearing the Nintendo Power Glove from back in the day except she wasn’t playing Mike Tyson’s Punch Out. she was playing The Kit
Kate: bang.that.kit.
Brian: technology moves slow to quebec
Reid: I hope she singlehandedly brings back the fingerless glove as a must-have fashion accessory
Austin: “I love the power glove. It’s so bad.”
Kate: i liked it when she did the robot
Reid: is that what that was?
Jason: I think everyone played a minimum of seven different instruments during the show. one dude only played four and he was booed when he left the stage
Caren: How about the guy climbing the railing??
Reid: that was Will, right?
Val: yeah - that was Will. He is a beast.
Reid: only there was no actual “railing”
Kate: will. check.
Caren: Kate, I like your use of periods. in. sentences.
Jason: it’s very arcade-fire-esque
Austin: Punctuation is important. So is the Arcade Fire.
Mark: beast.climbs.good.
Kate: Mark.is.funny.
Reid: did anyone else nearly lose their voice?
Val: Win sounded like he was losing his voice a few times
Jason: a guy three rows in front of me almost lost his voice. but Win looked at him from stage, made eye contact, and then he was healed and i saw him crying out in the lobby after the show
Reid: I’d almost believe that
Caren: The church of the Arcade Fire.
Kate: so many tears. I’d hate to see you guys at a Joshua Radin show.
Jason: “Can I get some more tears in the monitor?”
Kate: They’d have to put down a dang slip’n’slide
Austin: one time I lost my voice laughing at James Blunt
(Long pause)
Kate: i love that everyone stopped after james blunt. we got NOTHING
Reid: too easy
Austin: sorry to kill the party, doodz!!111
Kate: Jason, can you take that one?
Austin: James Blunt. Go!
Jason: James Blunt, Oprah, women, empathy, the world felt close for one moment, brain explosion time
Kate: very nice, Killingsworth.
Caren: It was kind of cult like that everyone knew the words at this show
Reid: Alexander!
Val: older brother!
Jason: did you notice that Win said “we are The Arcade Fire” with a “The”
Reid: he’s said before that they don’t really care. The or no The
Caren: In my iTunes it is credited “Arcade Fire, The”
Kate: i was too busy being annoyed that he said that. we saw him at la fonda latina before the show
Caren: who? Win?
Kate: yeah win. he had his foot on the table, which is kind of rude if you ask me
Jason: a Texan who moved to Canada but still eats Mexican. he’s a cultural chameleon
Brian: he likes Cuban food?
Austin: I didn’t think they allowed Cubans north of the border
Jason: maybe his combat boots cut off circulation to his feet and he had to elevate them for medical reasons
Caren: Closing thoughts?
Brian: my fav b-sides song is “Neighborhoods #8 (paella)”
Reid: coming to an internet leak real soon.
Jason: that red-haired dude in the band looked like Jon Heder
The End.
For Paste,
Caren
Email
now THIS makes me miss working with all of you.
My contribution is thus: I almost didn’t go because I have a major sinus infection but then I decided that if Win Butler is so badass that he would keep touring through a sinus infection to the point that the then had to CANCEL THE TOUR and have SINUS SURGERY, then surely I could make it through one show. It was very surreal and fuzzy (though maybe that was the Civic Center’s sound system) but totally worth it. But I now sing my own version of “My Body Is A Cage” which goes, “My sinus is a caaaaaaaage that keeps me from yelling along to the songs I looooove"… doesn’t have quite the same ring to it but whatever.
Umm...we have to do this again soon.
So when does the inevitable Arcade Fire backlash start? How about today?
They’re good. They’re not messianic.
Now Frog Eyes, there’s a band that’s messianic (as in the homeless guy on the streetcorner with spittle in his beard who think he’s God). They work the same territory as Arcade Fire, and they aren’t quite as No Cars Go Where the Streets Have No Name predictable.
Boo, Andy, Booooooo.
So sorry to miss the chat for, appropriately, a funeral. I didn’t cry, but I actually high-fived some dude I didn’t know after “Wake Up,” which I’d been waiting two full concerts to hear (they didn’t play it at the church show I went to in New York).” And not the fist-to-fist, but full-on, Chipper-just-hit-a-walk-off, palm-to-palm high-five.
Andy, based on your comments above, I have decided to accept your (implied) challenge and go see Frog Eyes on Tuesday when they come to our town.
Great show,and another Arcade Fire show here: http://islandsofecstasy.blogspot.com/
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