Fences, Cheap Girls, and Against Me! at the Knitting Factory on Saturday, February 5th
Ever since seeing Fences play at Bumbershoot last summer their tunes have been non-stop in the house. We enjoy the style of every song and some of the tunes are perfect pop jams. It’s punk rock yet still classy and hooks you like a bra clasp. Songs like “Girls with Accents” and “Sadie” float through my ear buds and stay inside my mind for hours. It was so cool to have Fences come to Spokane and be on the Against Me! tour! I was a little nervous about how a rowdy punk rock crowd would react to the more laidback style of Fences but people were really cool. I even saw a few kids singing along to “Girls with Accents.” On top of being super excited Fences was in Spokane, they sounded fucking perfect on stage! I hope I see more and more of their name on show flyers and concert calendars. During the final song Chris simple said thank you and put down his guitar and walked off the stage while the band continued to play. If you live in Seattle you have no excuse for not seeing this band, but to help you and point you in the right direction check out their website here.
I hadn’t heard of or seen Cheap Girls until tonight. This tight little three piece from Michigan kept the songs rolling and managed to kick the shit out of their opening set. Simple, fun alternative rock; pop hooks and fast paced. It was song after song as kids were bopping their heads in the crowd; I even caught myself rocking back and forth. They didn’t chat much and kept it easy going, by the looks of the floor kids were digging it. I loved the cherry red drum set and the laid back attitude. I could definitely see myself listening to them this summer. Learn more about Cheap Girls for yourself here, hopefully we get the chance to catch them again in concert!
This would be my second time seeing Against Me! and I think Matt has seen them quite a few times, maybe like 10 or more; regardless we were stoked to see them concert again (obviously since we went to the show)! With our beers in hand we sang along to a lot of the songs Against Me! treated the crowd with! It was cool to hear the bar sing along with us to “From Her Lips to God’s Ears,” “Don’t Lose Touch,” “White People for Peace,” “I Was A Teenage Anarchist,” “The Ocean,” “T.S.R.,” “Thrash Unreal,” “Miami,” “Sink Florida Sink,” and many many more! I would also like to add that I wasn’t the only one singing, kids in the crowd knew the new and the old songs and were right there with me singing along! Even Tom the singer thanked the crowd for singing along. Also props (yes I said props) to the band for allowing this kid to stand on stage for a second and not just push him off. So, what happened was there was no secutiry by the stairs to get on stage so a kid totally ran on stage and stood there for a second, while the band continued a song, then he proceed to
stagedive – it was beautiful! HOWEVER, security still didn’t learn the lesson because it happened again this time with a girl but she just took a photo and got kicked out, no stage dive – lame! I mean really if you are going to risk getting on stage at a punk rock show you should really stage dive!
Against Me! continually puts on a killer show with high energy and they really just kick you in the ass. I also can’t get over the vocals Tom has, he can sing so damn well! In fact when they left the stage the crowd was chanting to play more play more! I could listen to them all night long… maybe that’s why we never miss their show when they are in town! Also in case you haven’t heard Against Me! will be playing at Sasquatch! Music Festival this year! Looks like we will get to rock out and sing along to this band again very soon!
Check out Against Me! HERE and for more info on Sasquatch! Music Festival Click Here!
Photos courtesy of Matt Auclair.
