Bell X1 @ Cafe Du Nord (3/26/2008)

I arrived to the show last night as the opening band was kicking off their set. This was the first time I've heard of the LA-based Submarines and most likely the last. That's not to say they were bad. Not at all. They were a decent 3-piece made-up of a white male drummer with an amazing afro, a male bassist/vocalist and a female guitarist/vocalist. The 3-some reminded me of an alternative band trying too hard to be poppy. Sounding very similar to the recent Apple iPod/iPhone/Air TV commercials. The female vocalist also played what sounded like a xylophone which again reminded me of the quirky Apple music ads.

After 45 minutes, which was about 20 minutes longer than it should have been for an opening band of their caliber, they finally decided to cede command of the stage and let those in the audience clamor for the band we were all really there to see... Bell X1.

Honestly, I didn't know too much about Bell X1 before tonight's show. I knew they were an Irish rock band that was gaining popularity here in the states largely due to their recent hit single that appeared on the TV show "Grey's Anatomy". But that was about it! Here's what Wikipedia has to say about them:

"Bell X1 are an Irish rock band from North County Kildare in Ireland. They have thus far released three critically-acclaimed albums in Ireland, and are rapidly gaining success in the United States, where their music has been used on popular television shows such as The O.C. and Grey's Anatomy. Their third album, Flock, which was previously only released in Ireland and later in the UK, has recently received a North American release in February 2008."

What I can tell you now after hearing them play last night, is that they sound like a combination of Snow Patrol, The Talking Heads/David Byrne, and just a touch of VH-1's favorite, James Blunt.

Minutes before 10pm, the band came on stage and kicked their set off with the song "Bad Skin Day". The song is one of the more 'Snow Patrol'-ish of their collection. (Snow Patrol is another Irish rock band if you're not familiar with the reference.) Take a look at the video below -- it might be a bit blurry, but the sound is decent.

Bad Skin Day:


A few songs later came Bell's current single here in the US, "Rocky Took a Lover":


Soon after came the 70's struttin' "Flame" which is one of the stronger Talking Heads influenced tracks:


"Reacharound" had a brief introduction about the drummer's first visit to the US back in 1994 as an irish student shacking up with a house full of other irish -- a rite of passage for most irish kids before going to university. Here's "Reacharound" (with more Talking Heads influence):


The entire set-list looked like this:

• Bad Skin Day
  
• My First Born for a Song
  
• Alphabet Soup
  
• Natalie
  
• Next to You
  
• Rocky Took a Lover
  
• Eve, The Apple of My Eye
  
• Trampoline
  
• Tongue
  
• White Water Song
  
• Flame
  

All-in-all, a great show at a tiny venue for a band that will surely see more success in the near future. Be sure to check out their website to keep up with their tour dates and if you have the chance, definitely check them out!

Filter @ Cafe Du Nord (3/3/08)

Richard Patrick and company tried their hardest last night to rock the doors off the small Cafe Du Nord on Market Street in San Francisco. Patrick's reincarnation of his original band, Filter, came together after a 5 year hiatus while he joined the ex-Stone Temple Pilot DeLeo Brothers on their recent "Army of Anyone" project.

Patrick last visited SF with Army of Anyone just over a year ago when they played Slim's -- you can read my review and check out a video of "Take a Picture" here!

The Cafe Du Nord show was one of 3, very intimate west-coast club shows that Patrick was using as a warm-up before heading out on the summer festival circuit starting in a few weeks.

A local band, Cold Hot Crash, opened the night with a short 25 minute set that concluded with a classic by the punk-metal band, Helmet -- their anthem, "Unsung" -- which was a nice finishing touch to a band that reminded me most of the Foo Fighters.

After a brief 30-minute set-change, Patrick followed his bandmates onstage and kicked into high gear with a pounding rendition of "Welcome to the Fold". Considering Filter's new album, "Anthems for the Damned" is due out in May, I was expecting Patrick to play a higher percentage of new/unreleased material from the forthcoming album, but he stuck to the classics last night and only played 2 new songs; one of which can be found on their MySpace page here (at the time of this writing).

I found a copy of the San Diego setlist and from what I remember, it looks very similar to the one from last night with the notes that I've included below:

• Intro
  
• Welcome to the Fold
  
• American Cliche
  
• The Take (San Diego)
  
• Where Do We Go From Here
  
• Trip Like I Do
  
• It's Gonna Kill Me
  
• The Wake (San Diego)
  
• Jurassitol
  
• Kill the Day (San Diego)
  
• Captain Bligh
  
• Soldiers of Misfortune (New)
  
• Hey Man, Nice Shot
  
• (There was supposed to be the encore here)
  
• Cold (skipped)
  
• Take a Picture
  

Here's a nice video of their performance of their version of The Crystal Method's 'Trip Like I Do' that Filter/Richard Patrick remixed for the Spawn movie soundtrack. Here's "(Can't You) Trip Like I Do":



As you can tell from the pictures and video I shot, I was close enough to the stage to see the setlist throughout the show and noticed that 2 songs near the middle of the set were already blacked-out as the show began. I also noticed that a 3rd song was skipped that should have been part of the encore. These could have been new tracks from the new album, but I don't know for sure.

Unfortunately, there's no easy way on or off the stage at the Cafe Du Nord, so at the end of what was meant to be the 'first set', Patrick found himself and the band almost trapped on-stage -- or at least felt that it would have been too much of a hassle to jump off-stage and wade through the crowd to reach the side door, and then wade back through the crowd to get back onstage for a formal encore. So, instead of a 2-song encore, the band closed out the night with "Take a Picture".

Before breaking out into "Take a Picture", Richard explained that while he shopped the single around to potential record labels, the labels didn't understand the drastic departure from the previous harder/industrial Filter album -- and were too risk adverse to sign the band and the new album to a deal. In their minds, they wanted more of the same "Hey Man, Nice Shot" -- not all that different from the mentality of the labels today... resisting change and fighting their customers.

Here's the video for "Hey Man, Nice Shot":



Followed by the video for "Take a Picture":