Gardens & Villa + Tapes 'n Tapes @ Casbah- 03.16.11

Tapes 'n Tapes recently made their way back to the Casbah where Santa Barbara's Gardens & Villa opened up and damn near stole the show. More after the jump.

Leading off a rare two-band evening at the Casbah, Gardens & Villa took to a very crowded stage (they were working with most of T 'n T's equipment surrounding them) and a steadily growing crowd. Sezio had the early word on these gents from up the coast and they were very much on point in their promotion. Their I-can't-quite-pin-it-down style of electro indie pop draws comparisons to Passion Pit, but there's also a little Suckers-esque weirdness (in a good way) that plays very well on stage. Lead man Chris Lynch splits time with vocals, guitar and a quiver of wooden flutes to impressive effect while the rest of the quartet shares in vocal duties while mixing in musically. It all came together quite well and left everyone in attendance saying 'Wow- who are these guys?'. Look for them to be the featured act at a venue in your neighborhood in the near future (as well as opening up for Cuckoo Chaos at Soda Bar on April 29).

Gardens & Villa:

Tapes 'n Tapes' first trip back to SD in just over two years coincided with the last stop of their tour before they headed east to catch the tail end of SXSW. Playing in benefit of their newly released third full length album Outside, the Minneapolis-based four-piece showed just what a few years of experience can do for a live performance. Not that they were bad the last time around- far from it. This time they came across as a much more polished, professional band with a healthy dose of stage presence. They ripped through an hour plus of tracks from The Loon, Walk It Off and their newest album, ranging from the blistering 'Insistor' to the downtempo 'Omaha' to a grateful sold out crowd before calling it a night and packing up the van for the long drive to Austin.

Tapes 'n Tapes:

More pix from the evening click here and the rest of my concert photography here.

_______________________
All images copyright © Nate Vandermeulen, All Rights Reserved.
Please ask for permission before downloading or linking to them.

Tapes n Tapes, Casbah, 5.7.08

I was pretty spent on Wednesday after spending a late night at the Ken on Tuesday night, but before my friend Greg moved back east, he gave me his ticket to Tapes n Tapes, so I went with the motivating factor that I had to experience the show for him. It also occurred to me that since there was the weekend when I was sick and then the weekend when my brother was here, and basically a whole bunch of nights where I didn't motivate to drive, it had been at least a few weeks since I'd been to the Casbah and I was really missing it. I arrived while White Denim was onstage, and though they sounded great, I opted to hang on the patio catching up with friends I hadn't seen in a while.

Before Tapes n Tapes started, I went in to the venue where there was room for me to get up close with Natalie while the gear was still being loaded onstage. I saw Tapes n Tapes at Street Scene, but of course that huge stage doesn't compare with seeing the band up close. I was happy to be there and really enjoyed their set, took some pictures from my position up front, then about halfway through their set, thought I'd let someone else get up close, and retreated back into the crowd and bounced back and forth from the patio. I only have the first album, and heard mixed reviews on the new one, but after seeing them live, I'm gonna have to check it out, because the mix of new and old material sounded just fine to me.





Tapes n Tapes Setlist, Casbah, 5.7.08

Natalie was kind enough to score me the setlist after the show. It was also cool catching up with Tim Pyles, though he got kind of embarassed when we were talking and he was standing right in front of his shrine.



Of course, during the show my second wind kicked in and I finished the night with a quick beverage at the Ken Club before calling it a night.