Champagne Champagne, Fang Island, and Matt & Kim at the Showbox at the Market on Tuesday, September 28th
This was my first time at the Showbox at the Market…the first thing that I love about the venue is CLEAN BATHROOMS!!! WITH TOLIET SEAT COVERS! That aside we came a bit early for the listening party, yep Matt & Kim the dolls that they are decided to play all 10 tracks of their new album “Sidewalks” for us before the show started! I thought that was A) Super cool, since the sound guy normally just plays what he wishes, B) got me even more excited to pick up the new album because it sounds fabulous, and C) the party started once the doors opened!
Champagne Champagne… Champagne Champagne. Three guys on stage in front us of, two rapping and one mixing also known as “DJ Gajamagic + Pearl Dragon + Thomas Gray aka the commish = champagne.” I haven’t heard of Champagne Champagne until tonight. I caught on real quick though that when they say Champagne Champagne, you say it right back. Seattle though, this is one of their locals and they love Champagne Champagne. The band had a lot of energy, moving around, switching sides, hands in the air, and the crowd followed; it was like hip hop Simon Says. They were floating across the crowd, standing on the security rail, and making sure the energy level was rising. I loved the beats, and the words were just as powerful. If I lived in Seattle, I know I would be catching these guys more often. Toast to Champagne Champagne, and I am jacked to see these guys again.
Fang Island from Brooklyn, just hopped on tour with Matt & Kim for a few weeks. Fang Island was a forefront of four boys, three with electric guitars, and one with a bass guitar. Behind this line of electric strings was their drummer who had a jack o lantern painted on his kick drum. There were jack o lantern lights on a few items on stage as well. I say forefront because I couldn’t get over the line of intense catchy guitar riffs and almost power pop jamming. I loved it and wasn’t expecting it. Not a lot of lyrics, more just a slap in the face of dance music done on guitars. Fang Island played a couple of tunes for us including “Daisy” and “Seek it Out” which is a new song for their new record. They had the kids on the floor jumping and letting loose, people were digging them. They were digging Seattle; this was their second time in town. At the end of their set they had us all put our hands in the air and turn to our neighbors and give them a high five! It was pretty damn awesome. I hope I get to run into Fang Island in the future, it was quite the guitar spectacle of a show.
Oh man I had been excitedly awaiting this moment, the crowd was right there with me. The energy at this point was sky high and of course Matt & Kim would be the only band who could bring it up even higher.
5, 4,3,2,1 yea yeah yea yeah yea yeah, the Matt & Kim show was GRAND! AHHH that was one of the funnest, coolest, shows EVER! I can’t get over what happened last night. We just saw the highest energy set ever, and we have been to about 300 shows in two years. Nothing will ever compare to Matt & Kim. They “DON’T SLOW DOWN!” They didn’t know what night it was, but they officially made it Friday. Kim’s ear to ear grin never stopped she just looked like a kid on Christmas Morning with hundreds of presents under the tree. And Matt, well tonight was his “Birthday” sort of. It was his “Seattle Birthday,” his real birthday is a ways away in January but tonight it is Friday and it’s Matt’s Birthday and we had a fucking party.
With Matt & Kim Balloons floating in the air and a lil “Happy Birthday” song from the crowd to Matt it was a fireworks of a night. We did have to pop the balloons later though which was fun to hear, Kim doesn’t like when they land on her drums but she let it fly for half of the night, I don’t blame her. You know when you are at a show, and the crowd will go nuts when you hear the hits, well let’s just say the crowd never went down from the whole nuts thing… it was just nuts the entire show. With clapping, ass shaking, and jumping; there was so much of it the entire floor was shaking, the speaker stacks were shaking and even the stage was shaking. Plus Matt & Kim were on top of their instruments and in the crowd and just shaking it for us! Matt & Kim treated us with “Cutdown,” “Good Ol’ Fashion Nightmare,” “Yea Yeah,” “Daylight,” “Lightspeed,” “It’s a Fact-Printed Stained,” “Silver Tiles,” “Lessons Learned,” “Cinders,” “I’ll Take Us Home,” “Just A Friend (a Biz Markie Cover)” “Better Off Alone (a Alice DeeJay Cover)” and oh my gosh I know there were a few more in there but I was too busy dancing to write everything down!
But in-between all of their glorious music they talked to us and made the songs seem even cooler! Before their last song “Daylight” Matt said this is for anyone who has had a tough day, tough week, or tough year; because their fans have told them that this song makes them want to get out of bed in the morning. Which makes sense because they make just the funnest music, and it so upbeat and just wild. And yes funnest is a word on checkitoutmusic.com. We also learned that Kim has a fab booty from running at Penn State, and she can shake it while standing on the crowds hands, shake it well and drop it like it’s hot! Matt loves Champagne Champagne more than Nirvana. He also loves how Champagne Champagne has the crowd shout back their name, he had us do it with Matt & Kim, but Kim said that was stealing, ha.
We were also surprised with good news, Matt & Kim will be coming to Seattle more and more because Kim’s sister just moved to Seattle. Kim’s sister is also looking for a job so if you know of an employer hit Kim up! The set flew by and no one wanted the night to end but Matt said it pretty well “… we have played everything we can play some what well, otherwise we would play for hours.” Tonight we all let our self respect go and we had a killer fucking dance party/birthday party of a time. I can’t wait to have a Dance Party in my living room to Sidewalks (when it comes out on Nov. 2nd ) and see this sexy rockin’ dynamic duo once again on tour!
