9.21.17 - Tyto Alba with Happy Abandon, Florea, and Yesol - Syntax Physic Opera - Denver, CO
My first official show at Syntax! And it was a night dripping with good music and wonderful reverb, which I absolutely devoured all night. Each set was around 30 minutes. I ended up running into Matt Rossi the next night as I went back to take the above picture (I had forgotten the previous night) I had told him I was so glad I came but was absolutely exhausted by the end. “Dude everybody was” he responded, and let me know the show structure was set that way because of it. But that didn’t take away from a second night of fantastic music.
First up was Yesol, who played a harp that was accented by loops and beats that filled out her ethereal singing. She mentioned that one of her songs was a Roy Orbison cover, I didn’t catch which one it was, but nestled in with her original songs it blended well.
Next up was Florea with Megan Fong singing with her smokey voice on guitar, Alex Ferreira banging away on the drums and Eli Saragoussi strumming away on the upright bass they put on a set that had some good ol’ American feel to it. One of the songs they performed was called “Delirium” which is about New Orleans, it couldn’t have been in a better setting as Syntax reminds me so much of d.b.a. on Frenchman Street
I was happy that Happy Abandon started with “Severed Seam” again as I think (and told all of them) that it’s a prefect intro to the band. Their “louder” show was equally as great, Peter swapped his acoustic guitar for an electric and Jake took control of a laptop that added in some layers of accompaniment. (which on the second song he loaded in the wrong track and they had to start the song over, I love real moments like that)
Another song that made the cut for tonight was “Stop Taking Care of Me” I was really glad they played it again, I really latched onto it at SOFAR. And so did the guy somewhere behind me tonight as he said “fuck yeah” after. Peter told us a little about the song but was intentionally being vague about the true meaning. Talking to him after the show, the meaning brings to mind another favorite song of mine “I Don’t Have Anything” by VAST. I’m also purposefully being vague, as one should pull from both of those songs what they need from it.
Imagine how fortunate I felt that by coming to see Happy Abandon in turn I got to see a band who I was bummed I couldn’t see at UMS, headliner Tyto Alba celebrating the release of their video for “The Hunger”
Up on stage with her powerful voice was Melanie Steinway, Matt Rossi (guitar) who for a song swapped with Danny Dimarchi (bass) and keeping the beat in the back, Andrew Beir. As I mentioned earlier, there set also had the perfect amount of reverb, and I loved every second of it.
Check out the video! Syntax even makes an appearance!