Show Pics: The Soft Moon @ The Parish (1/21)

Last Friday, it was supposed to be some nostalgia with Killing Joke playing The Parish. However, they cancelled leaving plans in the lurch. The truly awesome news was that scheduled openers would still come to town and even better, they added Video in support. A last minute add of Autlier completely rounded out the night.

Click through – I have plenty of photos from the night and thoughts on The Parish’s recent upgrades.

Let’s start things with the recent changes at The Parish. Remember how clunky and cramped it was because of the sub boxes in front of the stage and the sound and lighting consoles back by the bar? Well, the subs have been removed and replaced with a below stage set up and the stage is bigger and more open now. Also, the sound and lighting has been pushed all the way to the back wall. Now, if they would only do something about that damn restrooms sign the annoying stays in the field of view. One bummer is that the investment in sound means that aging lighting isn’t being replaced or repaired. The stage is making do with to moving light, three fill sticks and strobe, though their presence is maximized by a perfect amount of haze from the fog machines.

Autlier is a project from Mike Sharp. It is hand-crafted ambient beats that hits my digital sweet spot. I loved it; loops from synths, solid beats that arrived and left like tides. Check out the bandcamp for Mike and take a listen. Staying tuned, for sure…

Swinging the pendulum the opposite direction, we got Video to grace us with their presence and world class rock and/or roll. The truly genuine and appreciated musical talents of the band we don’t deserve, but the band we need, was on display with a blistering set of stage presence and showmanship. If you have been reading the ATH for a while, you will know of our love for Video including a spot in our best of Austin in 2015 list. So good.

Finally, I get to see The Soft Moon at a proper venue. Not SxSW. Not a Festival set. A full on, all over the discography set, a set that spanned all the EPs and singles you heart desired. From the start with “Black” to the end with “Want”, the dedicated ans were blown away and the I-know-Killing-Joke-cancelled-but-we’ll-go-anyway-crowd was easily won over. I feel like the end of the show had left everyone exhausted, it was the equivalent for us fans of skydiving, everything afterwards was kind of blurry and numb. Cool.