Death Cab For Cutie and Frightened Rabbit in Chicago

At about 11:00 pm on August 25, after about 3 hours straight of live music, I exited the UIC Pavilion theater in Chicago and I realized that my jaw was sore. This wasn’t because I had been busy eating concession stand popcorn or talking throughout the show, it was because I had spent the near entirety of the concert beaming. It began when a band I hold close to my heart, a band introduced to me by my friend from Denmark opened. A band called Frightened Rabbit who hail from Scotland who I never in a million years dreamed I would have the opportunity to see live. They opened their set with a slowed down, rumbling version of “The Modern Leper,” the first song on their 2008 album “The Midnight Organ Fight.” They roared through an hour long set of songs, powered by 3 guitars and a bass that rumbled the entire building to the point where you could feel your nostrils shaking.

After Frightened Rabbit closed their set with “The Loneliness and the Scream” there was barely time for a quick walk to exercise your legs before Death Cab for Cutie took the stage and the crowd erupted as if someone had just detonated a bomb. They dove right in and opened with the eight and half minute long “I Will Possess Your Heart.” They then played an incredibly tight 18 song set, occasionally pausing for some brief dialogue from Ben Gibbards about everything from his drinking olive-oil onstage to preserve his voice to an audience member in the front row who was sporting a She & Him tee. After their 18 song set, which had just about every well known song in their repertoire; everything from the heart-on-sleeve ballad “I Will Follow You Into the Dark” to the sublime title track of their new album “Codes and Keys.”

Following a mere 30-45 seconds of applause after they closed their initial set with “Marching Bands of Manhattan,” Death Cab took the stage yet again to play not two, not three, but four encore songs; closing with two songs from their 2003 album “Transatlanticism.” The first being sing-along, television commercial-ready single “The Sound of Settling,” followed by the 8-minute epic title track, “Transatlanticism.”

A dynamic show by two dynamic bands. I heard they played an equally fantastic show the next evening in St. Paul, Minnesota, which was the last date on this tour. As Death Cab takes a month off to prepare for another leg of touring and Frightened Rabbit go on to continue promoting themselves as they begin to break through over here in the States, I will be anxiously awaiting new music, shows, and even philanthropical efforts from these bands (check out www.invisiblechildren.com for more information about a charity supported by both Death Cab for Cutie and Frightened Rabbit) that are already creating cultures and influences all across the board.

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