Nada Surf, An Horse – Live (March 25th, 2012)

It’s been almost two years since I last saw the Australian duo An Horse grace a stage in front of me. In that time, they’ve continued to tour, wrote and released a new album and gained more confidence and they used that confidence to full force last night. In a much larger venue than The Brixx in Edmonton, An Horse towered over the audience as the two piece spread themselves across the stage at the Rickshaw Theatre. They didn’t let the distance interfere with their performance but instead used their nonchalant attitude to bring the audience to them.

Their laid back indie-pop songs like Postcards, Walls, Camp Out, and Little Little Little among others in their 45 minute set slowly pulled the crowd in towards them. Their banter started off awkward, with a minute or so of pure silence as Kate Cooper fiddled with her pedal board but once they got past that misshape, the two made the crowd laugh as they listed the pros and cons of the Beta Max tape and how VHS is the way of the future.

As I’ve come to expect from An Horse, they put on a solid and engaging performance. One that pleased old fans and won over many new ones as well.

The same, however, can not me said for the headliners Nada Surf who were just plain boring.

Now to be perfectly honest, other than Popular – I couldn’t name you a single song by Nada Surf and after watching them play for close to two hours, that fact hasn’t changed and the reasons as to why have become clear. For you see, Nada Surf were a flash in the pan, one-hit wonder back in the mid nineties and it makes sense as the band has no personality to them.

Not only are their songs bland and generic but their own stage persona lacked any redeeming quality as well. They looked bored, as if they were going through the motions and they were trying way too hard to be cool that it became laughable. Fifteen minutes into their set I felt like leaving but kept saying “it’ll get better” and wanted to hear Popular anyway (which, by the way, they never ended up playing). The last few songs of their set, along with the first two songs in the encore, picked up the pace and people seemed more excited for them. But as their set ended, I just thought to myself “finally” and looked around to see that most people had actually left by this point. It turned out I wasn’t the only one who felt like leaving, but I was one of the rare few who decided to stay for the entire evening.