Show Pics: Interpol @ ACL Live (4/26)

Interpol with Matthew Dear AND Tycho? Yes, please.

As the floodgates start to open, one of the busiest weeks in Austin venues since 2019 is fully underway. Names like DIIV, My Morning Jacket, Amyl & The Sniffers, Brian Jonestown, Hot Chip are all on tap. My choices? I went with Cut Copy and Interpol. The bonus for Interpol, I also got Tycho and Matthew Dear. Better still, the show was hosted by ACL Live, a venue that should lend to highlight the tight, precise sound of both Tycho and Interpol.

What are you waiting for? Click through and check out the gallery and read a few thoughts if you are downstream of this early in the tour show and still on the fence. TLDR, GO SEE THIS SHOW.

Matthew Dear was up first. His performance was slightly subdued, a solo set with songs built by loops and backing synths. While the classically late Austin crowd trickled in, the set built up. By the end, the floor was filling and heads were bobbing to beats. Now, would a set with his full band been better? Sure. But as a starter to the night, perfect for me. Also, Austin, you paid for the ticket, get to the venue and watch the opener.

Tycho has been showing BTS videos on tour prep across social media. Testing tracks, who gets what job for the different songs, lighting, graphic design, all these pieces come together in the live set that uses Scott Hansens recognizable design aesthetic and signature sounds. As the show progresses, album covers and fuzzy projections of Scott are overlayed on the backdrop. Band members change instruments, aside from the drummer, and fill out a super tight sound that you know from the recordings. There is a pocket that songs like the last half A Walk or the post-break grooves in Dive. More recent tracks display the evolution that is both more dynamic and while familiar. While Tycho was able to make even Red 7 Patio sound good, this was by far the best sounding set from Tycho in any of the multiple times I have seen them. This was a perfect mix of venue and artist.

At the end of Tychos set, some people in front of my seats left. Big Tycho fans, I guess, but that was a mistake.

Interpol took the stage after a fairly lengthy setup swap where the crew removed a backdrop, reset the lighting rig and move risers off the stage. It dawned on me, now that we were back in the familiar darkness of the space behind the stage that the alignment of venue and band was about to happen again. The first few guitar picks of Untitled rattled through the crowd, put on the goosebumps. Highlights for me; Narc, Toni, Obstacle 1, NYC. Lighting was provided by pencil-beam spots, linear lighting rigs behind and room filling floods. It suited the bands distinctive precision, so well. Once more, the venue delivered the best from the band, the band delivered their best to the venue.

So good.