Words and pictures by @amandadissinger
It was a Saturday night. The crowd was full of realll cooool kids (including Steve Wozniak, seriously) anxiously waiting to see Cleveland’s Cloud Nothings. The Cloudies played their entire new album, Attack on Memory, out January 24th via Carpark and some old faves with support from Hunters, Plates of Cake and Your Youth.
Brooklyn duo Your Youth kicked off the night with their signature brand of bratty, hooky punk rock. The dudes were young, loud, and had a lot of fun playing simple songs that got the crowd revved up in the most serious way. Each song was short, to the point, and full of distortion… in da best way possible.
Plates of Cake kept the youthful rebellious vibeee going with their take on classic rock n’ roll. The Brooklyn four-piece played tracks from their recent self-titled debut, which were reminiscent of one of my faves, the Modern Lovers. Lead singer Jonathan Byerly’s deep, grizzly voice worked alongside the jangly, upbeat indie rock rhythms to create a seriously pretty set of pleasant garage folk rock. Oh and they were the reason Mr. Wozniak ventured to Glasslands, so that’s good to know.
Brooklyn band Hunters was the band I knew the least about (just heard a few recordings, which I liked) and a band I was seriously impressed with after seeing them. The energy of lead singer Isabel Almeida was unstoppable and fearless as she screamed and howled her way around the stage. The rest of the band (specifically guitarist Derek Watson) were full of rock and played perfect short punk rockers while crawling on the ground.
And finally it was time for Cloud Nothings, one of my very very favorite bands. Since hearing Dylan Baldi and co’s first album of garage pop rock gems 2010’s Turning On, I was completely and utterly hooked. Dylan started off by announcing, “here are some old songs and some new songs and we’re gonna play them all really fast”. And that they did, that they sure did.
The set commenced with a few faves from 2011’s self titled album, including “Understand at All”, “Heartbeat”, and “Forget You All the Time”. They sounded great, punchy, fun. Then the band made a segway into their newer, self-proclaimed “darker” material, full of moody screams and howls and warped guitars and none of that jangly, happy stuff we’ve heard on songs like “Should Have”.
It was in your face, raw, so on point.
First single “No Future/No Past” released just a few weeks ago was getting mad buzz from all the blogs, and the band worked with famed producer Steve Albini on the song (and the rest of the album). After hearing the tracks, I was completely blown away by the new direction the sound is taking- so honest and dark in the best possible way. I can’t wait for the rest of the world to hear it in a few weeks.
In short: Cloud Nothings killed it at Glasslands on Saturday. I’m sorry if you weren’t there, it ruled.