Citizen and You Blew It! Give The Sinclair the Ultimate Sunday Funday

Phillip Morgan ‘18 / Emertainment Monthly Staff Writer

As You Blew It!’s guitarist Andy Anaya remarked during their set, “When you’re told the show has a 10:00 AM load-in time (meaning the show begins at 1:00 PM) on a Sunday, you don’t really expect anyone to come.” Add onto that a horrendously crowded street fair engulfing all of Cambridge making the 0.2 mile walk to The Sinclair almost impossible (in this case, obviously a euphemism for it taking fifteen minutes instead of five), and you have a seemingly surefire recipe for a shitty turnout. Then, just when I finally realized the floor of The Sinclair was jam-packed, Anaya told the crowd they just found out this was the first sold-out show on the tour, at which point the crowd understandably went rabid with excitement. That a tour with a relatively unknown headliner like Ann Arbor, MI’s Citizen could sell out The Sinclair at 1:00 PM on a Sunday afternoon during a street fair was certainly impressive by itself, but their performance was on an entirely different level.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zOUuoUeY7PE

More on them in a moment. Before them was Orlando, FL indie/emo quartet You Blew It!, who I was especially excited for because their newest LP Keep Doing What You’re Doing has become one of my favorite records of this year. To say they killed it honestly wouldn’t do them justice. Even though frontman Tanner Jones chose to play through the stage left mic, his presence vocally and musically could be felt on every song, and his positioning actually forced the audience to view the band in a more panoramic setting as opposed to the tradition of the singer in the center with the other members supporting him. Though he chose to share the limelight with the whole band, it was lead guitarist Andy Anaya who was the true star the show though, as their set began with Anaya deciding to warm up with the riff to Metallica’s “Master of Puppets,” at which point Jones declared, “Hello everyone, we’re a band called You Blew It!, and none of our songs sound anything like that.” He then proceeded to play metal riffs between nearly every song just to spite Jones. During the actual music, however, Anaya proved a powerhouse on the guitar, ripping through all their intricate math-rock inspired melodies with expert precision. It was also through their constant banter that Jones declared the day an “Official Sunday Funday” in honor of the show selling out despite their expectations, and they were certainly dedicated to that idea.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lwpynnpxa80

A lot could be said about the tightness and energy of the band as a unit, but the best example came from an unexpected request. Midway through the set Jones announced someone on that morning asked them on twitter to play “I’m Bill Paxton,” an older song off their 2012 LP Grow Up, Dude which they apparently hadn’t played live in a while. Jones attempted to voice concern that they weren’t prepared for such a request but only mumbled a few syllables before Anaya and bassist Andy Vila immediately yelled, “Fuck it! We’re playing Bill Paxton!” And so they did. Almost flawlessly. With little to no preparation and a relatively new drummer (Matt Nissley joined the band shortly after the release of their new record). And then, since that went pretty well, they decided to just go ahead and play another song from their old record they hadn’t performed recently. That alone speaks volumes of not only  their abilities as an ensemble and their concern for their fanbase, but also the aura of pure, childlike excitement they bring to their shows. They talk, act, and play like four guys who are just happy to be there, and judging from the crowd’s response, such energy is highly contagious.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hSEUniLNSFU

Finally, Citizen took the stage, and an entirely different kind of energy filled the room. The emo/punk quintet was dead silent as they took the stage, the only distinct sound the dark, shoegaze-like roar of lead guitarist Nick Hamm as he tested his gear. Once they were done setting up, they went straight into their first song that began with an intro featuring only Hamm and frontman Mat Kerekes before the rest of the band joined in on the main riff, which pretty much exemplified the dynamic of the band throughout their set. Between Hamm’s dark, moody melodies and watery, distortion-heavy sonics along with Kerekes’s subdued, murky, almost ghost-like vocals, they shape the sound of the entire band in nearly every song. Fortunately, the remaining three members are incredibly talented in their own right, and they didn’t appear to have a Steven Tyler/Joe Perry Complex, as neither of them tried to overpower the rest of the band or dominate the audience’s attention.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSMjurEMDiQ

In fact, they were probably the most reserved band of the afternoon overall, engaging the audience and clearly enjoying themselves, but never in the jocular way that You Blew It! interacted with the crowd. The five was clearly focused almost entirely on the music, and Kerekes only really addressed the audience a few  times, the only one of significance being when Kerekes took a moment to announce they were about to play the new single they released shortly before the tour and they had limited copies of at their merch table that would only be sold on this tour.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w1BQ7-65K4s

Such stoicism is rarely demonstrated in a band of their ilk, but that was ok, because their music was all the dialogue the crowd needed. There wasn’t a song that the crowd didn’t howl the words to, to the point that at times Kerekes just gave up trying to sing over them and leaned the mic into the mosh pit. Since Citizen’s repertoire, most of which came from their most recent LP, 2013’s Youth, didn’t really contain any circle-pit moments, the center of the mosh pit sent wave after wave of crowd-surfers their direction, and Kerekes eve let one of them briefly hold the mic to sing the end of the song “Figure You Out.” As a whole band, Citizen sounded like a jet engine taking off ten feet away from you, and even the quiet moments in their set felt like there was some fierce intensity brewing behind the scenes. That contrast perfectly sums up Citizen’s general demeanor: intensity without aggression, brief but well-spoken, and light-hearted and personable without being campy. In short, Citizen towered over The Sinclair that Sunday afternoon, and I for one still felt the hairs on the back of my neck sticking up long after I was on the T ride home.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KrfueEvUpAs

So, two very different bands visited Cambridge that Sunday, but together they managed to sell out a 1:00 PM show even while surrounded by a massive fair, and transformed what could’ve been another measly afternoon concert into an event that can only be described as a true Sunday Funday. You’re only hurting yourself if you don’t give these bands a listen.