Show Pics: Nada Surf @ The Parish (5/27)

I was allowed to kick off my holiday weekend with some fun show bidness. After morning rain, a cold front blew through to give us a nice evening and I had spots to go take in Nada Surf at The Parish. When I have several separate circles of friends at the show, it warms your humidity-laden heart.

Click through. I have plenty of pics from the night and a few thoughts including some on the openers, The Misteries.

The last time I was at The Parish, they had just finished an audio remodel getting even better sound in that room. After all, they have competition for best sounding smallish room in Austin in 310. Well, the once amazing lighting was lacking due to gear failures, but the varilights have mushroomed up and along with a few from the bands touring set up, we had some pretty glow.

THe Misteries were up first. The Seventies live with this band out of Dallas that use guitar and vocal harmonies to draw the listener in and then launch from there on a two minute solo or full band jam. But they aren’t strictly a nostalgia act. There is modern sensibility to song structures and instrumentation, such as the occasional use of a KORG mini-synth in place of the traditional Hammond. They seemed to really relish playing for people they knew had never heard their music before. What better reason to be in rock and roll than to show off a little? The band has a little momentum going, recent opening spots with We Are Scientists, Moving Panoramas and Nada Surf. Take a listen.

Nada Surf is out to promote the new record, You Know Who You Are. …and they play quite a few tracks from it. To appease the fans, they decided to do almost two hours. You see notes for effects pedals settings and binders with notes on stage monitors. It was a huge set and when you have a catalog over two decades, there are tough choices. But I don’t think anyone could leave disappointed. We had sing-alongs, swaying, ballads and power pop. We even got “Popular” into “Always Love” that put ATH faves back-to-back. Final encore was a full acoustic version of “Blizzard of ’77”. There are videos of it around the intarwebs. It was a lovely evening, room filled with friends.