Motion City Soundtrack @ Tribeca Rock Club, NYC
Live Reviews | Sep 20th, 2005
Date: September 14th, 2005
Venue: Tribeca Rock Club, NYC
Despite the fact that it was a CMJ show, and I expected to be surrounded by a lot of the hipster geeks who have been wandering the city with their ridiculous passes strewn about their necks, Motion City Soundtrack at the Tribeca Rock Club was surprisingly a phenomenal show.
If you’ve never been to The Tribeca, you should know how small it is. Tiny. Smaller than the Knitting Factory and a tad bigger than the Continental. I’ve recently seen Motion City on the Warped Tour, for three dates to be exact. While he couldn’t quite clean the oven or check his tires on stage, singer Justin Pierre conveyed an air of uneasiness at these larger Warped shows than last night when he seemed completely comfortable in such an intimate setting. He’s often jumpy and avoiding eye contact, but at this show there was even a little banter with the crowd, which was receptive to say the least. Not to mention the guy who kept yelling out “Pete Peterson” got a song sent out to, you guessed it, Pete Peterson.
If you went to the show not knowing who Motion City is, I can almost guarantee you walked out a fan and bought or stole some form of their music the next day. Everyone there was totally into these guys. Mostly true, fist-pumping and clapping Motion City fans were in attendance and able to sing the verse during “Red Dress” as Justin fell silent and let the crowd take over. They played a number of older favorites like “Capital H”, “Boombox Generation” and “The Future Freaks Me Out” from their 1999 release “I Am The Movie”, but got a better response overall for songs on their newest album, “Commit This To Memory”. Perhaps it is because Motion City Soundtrack’s live performance is beginning to be recognized as able to live up to the splendor of both their albums to date.
Personally, the show could have been a ton better for me had the crowd been moving a bit more. They were into the show, but I guess they were just not a very athletic crowd, maybe a little lazy. Not to mention the kid in front of me who was about 2 feet taller than me trying to protect his girlfriend from who knows what was completely stationary. I managed to get some great pictures from the space in between his left ear and left shoulder. I still have failed at every attempt to capture the glory that is the “moog stand” on film. For those of you who are unfamiliar, said “moog stand” is the term for when moogist, Jesse Johnson does a handstand on his moog mid way through “My Favorite Accident”. That’s right… a handstand! On a moog! It doesn’t get any better than that.
