with Something Corporate, Fiction Plane and Cordalene
February 14, 2003
Trocadero theater, Philadelphia PA
Perhaps the new music publicity trend is a “free acoustic show cd signing!” Such
a concept is nothing new, but perhaps new to the rock scene of today.
Enter the Juliana Theory and their recent acoustic show at AKA Music before
their sold out performance at the Trocadero later that night. Unsure the
amount of
attention AKA would receive that night we arrived over an hour early. Plenty
of time to browse through AKA’s fine assortment of vinyl’s. From
Barry Manalow to Jets to Brazil, AKA had it all including those hard to find
Wesley Willis records.
The acoustic set included their self-proclaimed hit “Do You Believe Me?”, “Jewel
to Sparkle”, “Into the Dark”, and “White Days”.
The conga drums were an expressive piece of percussion, and the guitars were
of course necessary to the mix. Lead singer and guitar player Brett Detar was
struggling to hit the high notes on the first few songs, but seemed to warm up
by the last.
Our ten block walk to the Trocadero wasn’t as cold as 31 degrees could
have felt. Once there, the opening band Cordalene put on a good show. Musically
talented, good style, and a presence that could have been more enthusiastic.
After the show in the lobby their lead singer was taking sign-ups for their mailing
list and was very kind and appreciative of our comments.
Fiction Plane, from London, England, played a great five song set. The only bad
part of their set was the length! They had terrific originality, incredible dynamics
(what makes the music “breathe”), and all around amazing song writing.
Definitely check these guys out.
Something Corporate was interesting. It was pretty much “The Andrew McMahon
Show”, but he was fun to watch anyway. The rest of the band kind of smiled
and walked around every so often, not really getting into the act the way McHahon
did.
Then the Juliana Theory. The music was good, almost exactly how it sounds on
the CD. They were dressed up in plain outfits, dancing around enthusiastically.
Several of the songs had keyboard intros that were prerecorded. Not a problem,
but neither is playing a keyboard. Not a particularly spectacular set list, but
the songs were a healthy mix of songs from “Emotion is Dead” and
their new album “Love”.
MUSIC 8
PRESENCE 4
FUN 5
MERCH 7
TheJulianaTheory.com for
music samples and more
TheTroc.com for complete events listing
© 2003 Marc Hummel
