A look back at the Wed., June 19 show, with photos.
by Leilani Polk and DrunkCameraGuy.comIt’s easy to write off Grizzly Bear as a too-successful by-product of the hipster iPod acid test index or, if you’re feeling particularly venomous, as just another overrated indie rock band from Brooklyn propelled into the spotlight via Pitchfork, which has yet to give Grizzly Bear a bad review (nothing under 7.4, and that was a remix album). [Text by Leilani, photos by Chris Spires/DCG.]
And even though Yellow House is one of my all-time favorite albums, I, too, am guilty of feeling a certain sense of knee-jerk indifference towards the band, though it’s not due to any lack on their part. Indeed, their mingling of alt folk, chamber pop, art rock and psychedelia is lush, textured, tasteful excellence, even if it comes off as a bit high brow at times. In fact, my biggest concern going into last week’s Grizzly Bear show at The Ritz Ybor was that a live performance by the quartet would be a subdued, nuanced, contemplative affair with some rocking highlights. Much to my surprise and pleasure, it proved just the opposite, a dazzling journey with lots of propulsive high energy rocking interspersed with some slower but no less dynamic meanderings.
I arrived at The Ritz to find it packed to capacity, the usual stoicism you find at shows like these replaced by a refreshing sense of anticipation; the room was buzzing, people were drinking and carousing like it wasn’t really a Wednesday night, and when Grizzly Bear hit the stage at around 9:15 p.m., the room erupted in heavy gushes of approval. Seeing so many of us packing that room on their first-ever stop in Tampa must have been a surprise for the band as well, considering that the musicians stopped at numerous points throughout the night to thank the crowd and express gratitude for so many of us coming out in the middle of a work week.
Against a backdrop of orange-glowing handmade jellyfish, Grizzly Bear plowed through a 90 minute set, playing the majority of numbers off 2012 fourth and latest Shields starting with a robust and driving version of “Speak in Rounds,” and filling out the rest of the setlist with several cuts from 2009’s Veckatimest— like a tight and rambunctious reading of the well-worn favorite “Two Weeks”— and a few highlights from 2006’s Yellow House and even “Shift” off ’05 debut, Horn of Plenty.
Unfortunately, the main room of The Ritz doesn’t always have the best sound quality and on this night, I had difficulty discerning all the subtleties of the band's arrangements, especially in the set’s first half. This was most noticeable about five songs deep during a favorite, “Lullaby,” its half-way point — when the delicate first half of the song launches into the churning instrumentals of its second half amid haunting chants of “Cheer up, chin up, cheer up, chin up, cheer up, chin up”— sounding more like washes of chaotic noise that the intertwining vocal melodies of Ed Droste and Daniel Rosen barely rose above, while the lowend frequencies in “Yet Again” made my arm hair stand on end and sternum vibrate with its force, so much so that at one point I wrote ‘high frequency sound devourer’ in reference to the room. Luckily, the sound seemed to get better as the night progressed (or I just got used to its terribleness).
“Thanks you guys. You’re nice, you’re just fucking nice. And we don’t swear lot,” Droste commented after Grizzly Bear returned to the stage to deliver an encore and the howling appreciation had finally died down. They repaid it in full with three songs that started with the stunning doo wop-melodic “Knife,” segued into the grandiose chorale of "On A Neck, On A Spit" and closed with an acoustic reading of “All We Ask,” leaving everyone in the room satisfied and breathless and hoping that our show of enthusiasm would bring Grizzly Bear back down south again, one day...
Setlist according to Setlist.com
Speak in Rounds
Adelma
Sleeping Ute
Cheerleader
Lullabye
Yet Again
Shift
A Simple Answer
Foreground
Gun-Shy
Ready, Able
While You Wait for the Others
What's Wrong
Two Weeks
Half Gate
Sun in Your Eyes
Encore:
Knife
On A Neck, On A Spit
All We Ask (Acoustic)