Gob – Live (Jan. 19th, 2008)

It was the first sold out show in 2008 for Jet Nightclub, a new club and venue that recently opened up on the south side of Edmonton; and what better way to mark the occasion than with the first proper Gob tour in some time? Yeah, they’ve played the occasional show here and there over the past few years – including a phenomenal Canada Day show here in Edmonton last July – but now they’re back with a new full length, Muertos Vivos, and ready to hit the road in support of it.

The fans packed the venue in anticipation for the Burnaby foursome and were treated to one hell of a show with one of the most well rounded set lists from a band in a long time. The tour was in support of Muertos Vivos but that didn’t constrict them to tracks from only that album. In fact, it was half a dozen or so songs into the set until they finally dipped into a cut from the album with We’re All Dying, instead they picked out songs from all their releases.

Opening up with fan favorites Ming Tran and For The Moment, Gob switched effortlessly from one album to another. Hitting tracks like Oh! Ellin, Prescription, Underground, Give Up The Grudge, Underground, I Hear You Calling and a surprisingly large amount of songs from How Far Shallow Takes You and Too Late No Friends like Self Appointed Leader or On These Days that always got the pit moving even more. Responding to fan shouts they ended the night with The Rolling Stone‘s Paint It Black and their hit single Soda before leaving the stage covered in sweat. Afterall, the band stayed closed to the crowd in the intimate venue and move almost as much as the pit did. Theo coached the crowd to join them in sing alongs and switched up the lyrics during No Regrets to include the city’s name. The sole downside of the night was that at time Tom’s vocals were a little low in the mix but it was normally made up for with crowd participation as everyone knew almost every word.

To say that Gob went above and beyond in the show would be a lie; but they really didn’t need to. Every person in the sold out crowd was a fan and the band played to their enjoyment, not trying to win over new fans but catering to those who were already there and knew every word. They played songs from every album for a well rounded set, they were funny, sounded great (Theo even got the distant vocal sound in the opening verse of We’re All Dying by standing a foot away from the microphone and screaming) and even hung out at the merch table after the show. I would have been hard pressed to find anyone who was disappointed with the evening.