Review: Thirty Seconds to Mars - This Is War

A quick one to say that my review of This Is War, by Thirty Seconds to Mars is up at Breakthroughband.com. You can read it here.

Pretension.

I think “pretentious” is now synonymous with something people don’t understand. That’s the thing I don’t get. If it is anything beyond what someone is used to, it is pretentious until ten years later, and then they go back and listen, and suddenly it is “ahead of its time.” If everyone was just more open-minded nothing would be pretentious, nothing would be ahead of its time, nothing would be genius. Everything would just be enjoyable to a certain extent. There’s no doubt there is music that just sucks, and there is no doubt there is music that is better than the rest. But people spend so much time trying to categorize it around what card it would be behind at Barnes and Noble, and above that to have to always say if something is smart, pretentious, or whatever. It’s the same thing as saying something sucks. No one gains anything from that.

-Casey Crescenzo

Brand New show 10-2-09 Cleveland

Caught Brand New before they headed out with Thrice, but I heard Manchester Orchestra was going to open for them, so that sealed the deal.

I became a fan of Manchester Orchestra when I heard "I've Got Friends" on the radio, then I happened to be in a record store and saw that Everything to Nothing was on sale for $8. I immediately liked the record, and coincidentally, thought they sounded like Brand New and should tour with them. Lo and Behold, my prophecy came true.

Brand New was pretty explosive, opening the show with you "You Won't Know" from the The Devil and God are Raging Inside Me. Their set spanned their catalog, but the songs I enjoyed the most were from Devil and God, including "Sowing Season (Yeah)", "Jesus Christ", and the very atmospheric "Welcome to Bangkok". They played a good bit of their new stuff from Daisy, most of which I didn't know, because I didn't have a chance to pick up the record before the show.

All in all, a good show. Not great, but memorable.

Empty

On the most recent open mic night, I performed "Empty" by Ray LaMontagne. You can watch an incomplete video of it here.