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October 14, 2010

Miike Snow Live @ House of Blues, Boston 10/10/10

Wow, yeah! The Miike Snow crew hit Boston on Sunday 10/10/10, an appropriate date seeing as the performance was no doubt a 10 10 10! Where to begin… ENERGY! This show had so much of it, from the band itself to the lights, the fog, the kids. We were literally moving the entire 75-minute or so set. Whew! That’s a hell of a workout!

Miike Snow’s 2009 record Animal is fantastic. One of the best pure songwriting records of last year; just the understanding displayed on that record of the multi-fold relationships between rhythm and melody and how the two pair and work together is off the meter. And really, the ability to write a song like Britney Spears’ Toxic, one of the best pop hooks of all time period, as the Swedish contingent of the band Christian Karlsson and Pontus Winnberg won a Grammy for doing, speaks for itself.

So, yes, the record is killer. But the live show…..FUCKING PHENOMENAL. Miike Snow’s Boston performance was truly that, a performance. The show had an arc, it had waves, it pulsed; the tempos pushed outwards, the arrangements ebbed inwards. The whole experience was just totally completely fantastic. Highlights from the set, for us, included a beefed up rendition of the pop perfect Black and Blue, and encore jam The Remedy. These are songs meant to be shouted, meant to be sung aloud, meant to be echoed back at a live show.

The crowd participation/into it-ness was at a very high level. The music was loud, but the kids were louder. The kids were overpowering. Waves of outstretched arms, bobbing heads, frantic shoulder manaeuvers, moved as shadows against the back-lit sextet of Miike Snow performers. The lights, fogs, lazers, other atmospheric type shit were great.

Near the show’s end, frontman Andrew Wyatt lamented that this would be Miike Snow’s last Boston gig for awhile, “We’re making a new record.” We can’t wait.

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