An Horse, Hot Panda – Live (June 11th, 2010)

Five months to the day after wowing people at the Northern Alberta Jubilee opening for Tegan and Sara, Australia’s indie-pop duo AN Horse were back in Edmonton- only this time they were the main attraction.

During the final leg of their tour for Rearrange Beds (they’re recording a new album next month in Vancouver), the band stopped at a nearly packed Brixx Bar & Grill and once again proved that less is more. Once the curtains were drawn back, Kate Cooper and Damen Cox walked onto the small stage and broke right into their set. The crowd moved in close to create a small gathering of friends all singing and tapping their feet along with their stripped down songs. Throughout their hour long set, the two played their entire debut record with songs like Horizons, Camp Out, Postcards and Scared As Fuck getting the best reaction.

On top of their energetic pop tunes, An Horse took a page out of Tegan and Sara’s play book and used simple, honest and comical anecdotes as the foundation of their between song banter, making the show feel more real than scripted (something many bands need to work on). Talking about Kate’s fear that her mother will show up in the front row at any show or Damon reliving his childhood fantasy of seeing one of the world’s biggest malls, An Horse joked amongst one another with simple stories rather than forced crowd participation.

With only eleven songs on their released repertoire, the band premiered a few tracks that they’ll be recording next month and the three tracks were some of the strongest of the night. A bit higher energy than Rearrange Beds, their new album already has some strong potential and it hasn’t even been recorded yet.

While the show ended oddly early for a Friday night (it was done by ten and it was still light out), An Horse did not disappoint in any way. Local openers Hot Panda were not to be missed either, playing a jittery brand of indie-rock akin to Modest Mouse, Hot Panda were almost as impressive as the headliners.  With a few multi-instrumentalists in their mix, it was seeing bassist Catherine Hiltz play both her bass and a trumpet at the same time that truly stood out. An energetic, bouncy and fun set that cumulated with a grunge rock jam breakdown, Hot Panda became warmed the crowd up nicely and will surely continue to make a name for themselves in the Edmonton music scene.