Monday, February 23, 2009

Thievery Corporation concert review

Absolutely brilliant show here in Toronto on Saturday night. It was much better than I anticipated and is one of the best shows I've seen in the last few years.

I was a little shocked about the ticket price when I initially heard about the date, but I must say it was worth every penny. The main men of TC, Rob Garza and Eric Hilton were stationed prime centre stage but raised and highlighted towards the back to let them DJ without the show just being about a couple of guys behind laptops. Front and centre and always on the move was the bass player, making the moves with the large rotation of singers (5 or 6 I believe, including 2 South American ladies, another lady from Tehran and 2 hip hop DC lads). They had two percussionists, a sitar player, and a wonderful trumpet and sax horns duo. Large screens showed a dazzling array of images and video.

The reviews have been a little hard to come by with the Toronto date being only #2 on the tour with Chicago being on Friday night (pics). The one review of the Toronto show wasn't that positive (mainly because of venue and sound issues), but it gives you a sense of the show. I think the Kool Haus is a decent venue for its size and sound is ok if you're familiar with the material. Towards the end of the 2 hour show they got about 20 groovy ladies from the audience up on stage to dance along with the band - quite the party ! Apparently, David Byrne jumped up on stage for one number in Chicago - wow, that would have been something to see. If you're a fan of their blend of electronica and world beats then I'm sure you'll love them live.

Highlights would be opening numbers Sound the Alarm and Madala from their latest album, Warning Shots "one" singalong, The Numbers Game, and of course Shadows of Ourselves.

The set list which I found on a cool little site called setlist.fm:
Links - main site, videos (incl. a good live montage - embedded below); myspace (tunes, dates etc)