Band Of Horses - The Enmore 29/07/10

It was a sold out show and it's not hard to see why. Over the last few years Band of Horses have been gaining more and more fans with their beautiful Hillbilly-chic music and as they are on the Splendour in the Grass line up this year, which is on this weekend, thankfully they decided to do a few sideshows.

Band of Horses opened with The Great Salt Lake and I was surprised to see a huge image of a lake with interesting rock formations projected onto the back wall behind the band. They sounded amazing and as the show progressed the images changed to reflect the general theme of the songs being played. The images also began to change throughout the songs and by 4th song the images were flicking by so fast I started to feel motion sick! I decided to stop watching the footage and start watching the band which helped.

They played some great old classics from Everything All the Time and Cease to Begin with some standouts for me being Is There A Ghost, Ode to LRC, and Islands on the Coast which had impressive photos of gigs and festivals that the band had taken. There was also a lot played off their new album Infinite Arms including the charming tune Blue Beard. I was surprised to see the keyboardist take lead vocals for the song Older. I knew it sounded slightly different from a lot of their other stuff but I hadn't picked it being a different singer. Great Song!

During the chorus of the soulful Detlef Schrempf one audience member nostalgically raised his or her lit cigarette lighter to the sky in appreciation. What followed was an angry security guard with a torch flashing at them to put it out. Soon after the entire crowd was lit up with little glowing flames waving in time from side to side! Sticken to the Man!!! It look awesome from my vantage point on the stairs near the back of the intimate venue!

When they played Cigarettes, Wedding Bands they had a fascinating backdrop of an old desert shack with the sky filled with fluffy clouds. That distracted me for a while but the band soon regained my attention when I was slapped in the face by a freaking amazing guitar solo. My notes here say 'Amazing guitar...HOLY CRAP!' :) They busted out Laredo which the fans loved and it was played with a backdrop of really interesting black and white pictures of the American mid west reinforcing their country influence and sound.

They played No One's Gonna Love You as part of their Encore and I was thoroughly satisfied as that's my favourite song by them, they also made heart felt thanks to many people that got them there and helped them along the way and Ben Bridwell (lead) went on about how appreciative he was of our rowdy audience. It was quite sweet.

It was a feast for the eyes, the ears, and the heart! The crowd was buzzing as it left and spilled out into the street. Band of Horses never disappoint and you'd have to have a heart of stone to not feel the emotion they pour into each and every song. Great gig!

Blue Beard.mp3 Be patient it's a big file.