The Show is the Rainbow, The Shakes & Terror Pigeon Dance Revolt

I will start off this show review by saying that I haven't been able to figure out how to write show review.  I mean I can type fine, but whenever I reread what I wrote about a show, I tend to focus a lot on the details and less on the overall feel.  I also tend to not use descriptive terms like "Screaming guitars" or "viscous animalistic vocals".  They never are really screaming and I haven't heard any vocals in my life that I would equate with animals, unless  they were intentionally so.  With this disclaimer being said, here's my effort in doing it. 


     I got to the Union in the middle of The Show Is The Rainbow's (TSITR) set.  I wish I got some pictures of him because he looks very different then he does in the current pictures he has up on his Myspace page.  The first thing I noticed was a slightly larger guy with long red hair, a big red beard and a pretty hairy torso dancing in front of the stage.  Man, he certainly looked like he was having fun.  Shane Shane was there with some other peeps from Screamin Cyn Cyn and the Pons and a handful of other people. TSITR was actually pretty awesome.  He had great beats playing off of his laptop (He even thanked the person who created these majestic beats..himself).  He had probably 10x's more energy then everyone else in that room combined which led him to climb over chairs, headbang whipping his long hair around, and doing some pretty cool tribal dance moves.   His music is actually well written and though sometimes I feel someone singing to a laptop takes away from the show, I can appreciate the time and effort he put into creating the music.  I got to talk to Darren afterwards for a short time and he said that he tries to make it to Wisconsin 2 or 3 times a year (he resides in Nebraska currently).  If you see this guy performing in town again, I definitely recommend everyone to see him.  

Second up was a member of the headlining band doing his solo thing.  His name was Jesse.  He seemed to hate to perform in front of the microphone and instead tried to get the audience as much as possible to get into his performance space with him.  We couldn't hear him so well when he sang without the mike, but what we could make out sounded great.  He had great vocals.  His music was more in his voice then his guitar, the solo instrument with him.  He had a folky sound to him when he was singing and in between some of those songs he would interject a few songs that he would rap.  He actually reminded me a lot of Why? because of this but with a lot simpler musical setup.  

Third up was The Shakes.  I wasn't really prepared for this band.  Everyone else was dancy, great lyrics and vocals, fun dancy music.  The Shakes were pure out punk music.  And as my friend said, they definitely looked the part. I actually appreciate punk and have been in quite a few mosh pits in my time.  But either it was because I saw this band out of a punk scene context or maybe it was because I just didn't care for them, but I thought they were not very good.  I did enjoy the guys who had some crazy dance moves happening in front of the stage during their performance.  I was really curious where these guys came from until I saw that they were in the headlining band.  ahhhh.   Well at least they rocked out to a good time.  I kind of sat down and had some beer instead.  Which would have been ok except they kept saying they wanted their vocals higher.  And higher.  No, sir, your vocals don't need to be higher.  Your music needs to be softer.  They were able to empty out a large number of the Union before the headlining act came on.

Last was Terror Pigeon Dance Revolt.  What?  While most bands take a large amount of time to set up their equipment and do sound check, TPDR took more time decorating the Union.  There were blow up lawn ornaments.  There was a glowing Snowman.  They had long chains of teddy bears that they threw around people's necks and around speakers.  They also had a giant costume box which they pulled out multiple outfits for people to wear during their show.  It was crazy, but I do love the simple way they were turning their performance space into a party space.  And everyone who showed up was digging it.  A larger crowd came up to the stage and many don different forms of dresses, wigs and other crazy outfits.  Others closed in tight around the two singers of TPDR who, one was only in his boxers while the other one had a giant red cape on.  We couldn't hear their songs to well (except their last song which was about something to do with a heart) but the crowd was loving every minute of their set.  We were more enjoying the two people who found each other drunkenly and proceeded to grind and makeout throughout the whole set.  They seriously were paying less attention to the performance then we were.  It's a good thing that people I was with tried to help them at least move to the beat, but alas, it didn't work out well.  
Anyway, that was the show.  Next show I probably will review will be

The Antlers w/ Phantogram This Sunday, April 18th at High Noon Saloon.