Review: Silversun Pickups, Viva Voce in Columbus OH

I was one of many people waiting a long time for this show. I had seen Silversun Pickups @ SXSW back in March. At the time, I was a casual fan. Seeing them live the first time I became a bigger fan. After the Columbus show, I am ready to start their fan club.

But we’re getting ahead of ourselves.

The night began with The Kingdom, indie pop from Portland. The band was good, and the lead singer did a great job of getting the crowd revved up for the rest of the night. I guess my problem with them was I felt like I had been there before musically, and nothing really challenged me during their set. The female keyboardist seems to sing a little more on their recorded material, but live I think she just joined in maybe once? A little bit more of her might have made them more interesting.

Viva Voce was next, and I must begin by apologizing to this band. I’ve had their album for a few months now, and up until this point I’ve really only given it a distracted listen. I was looking forward to their set but to be honest I really had little to no expectations for them. That’s where I was wrong. The band melted my face right off. I needed emergency surgery to get through the rest of the night, that’s how brutal the melting was. But I survived.

The band is made up of two people, Kevin Robinson and Anita Robinson. The amount of sound that this duo creates really blew my mind. At one point, Kevin was playing drums and guitar at the same friggin time.. while singing! Color me impressed. This is a duo that really puts all their energy into their show and it didn’t go unnoticed. Goddamn they’ve just become a favorite band of mine.

VV really set the bar as far as energy was concerned, so Silversun Pickups really had to knock one out of the part to keep the momentum going, and they did. This was the first time the band had played Columbus but judging from the crowd you wouldn’t notice that – people were going crazy all around me. A recent push on local alternative rock radio station CD101 really helps, that’s for sure.

The band played a lot of stuff from their new album, and threw in some songs from their debut EP. They came out for an encore, talked to the audience a lot and seemed to be really having a good time. Normally a band can play for about an hour and I’m ready to check out, but with Silversun I could have had them play all night and I would’ve been happy.

It really is rare to go to a show and have three touring acts come through town and genuinely like playing with each other. The Kingdom, Silversun Pickups and Viva Voce have been on the road for two weeks, and that’s like 5 years in Human Time. To have all three bands interact with each other and gush over one another during every set really has a positive impact on the crowd. The entire night had a positive vibe, and I went home and immediately checked to see if the band was playing in the area any time soon (they’re not, but I have hope).

Erik Kang took some great photos, click on the link to see some more.

To see more of Kang’s photos, go here.