No Doubt, Paramore, Bedouin Soundclash – Live (July 16th, 2009)

Preceded by The Offspring and Green Day, No Doubt’s reunion stop in Edmonton was the third of four nostalgia-laced shows this summer, a fact that forced me to  affectionately title this summer the Summer of Junior High.

Transporting the eager fans back in time a few years, the summer’s tour schedule appears to be re-visiting the care-free days of the turn of the century – and in some cases, re-visiting them for the first time in close to half a decade.

Gwen Stefani, Tony Kanal, Adrian Young and Tom Dumont – collectively known as No Doubt – were one of those bands who fell back and took a lengthy hiatus as Stefani released two solo albums.  Not having toured for five years, their last tour taking place in 2004 with Blink-182 (who, coincidentally, will cap off the Summer of Junior High exactly two weeks from today when they pass through Rexall on July 31st), the anticipation for the show was at an all-time high. Without a new album or single to support the tour, the band instead played through their lengthy catalogue and treated the 11,000+ fans to a collection of greatest hits spanning from Just A Girl to Rock Steady.

Opening for the California quartet was Toronto based reggae act Bedouin Soundclash who put on a good, albeit forgettable, performance whose major highlights were their breakthrough single When The Night Feels My Song and Jeb Rand. While the addition of a touring saxophone and trumpet added a nice additional aspect to the band’s sound, it was Paramore who really kick started the evening.

Proudly taking the torch from No Doubt, the Nashville pop-rock outfit is preparing to become the go-to band for female fronted rock acts and were the main attraction for some of the younger audience members. The twenty-year old, orange-haired front woman Hayley Williams controlled the crowd with her high reaching vocals and energetic persona, clearly having taken some cues from Stefani.

Kicking off the show with Misery Business, the band wasted no time in showing that they could handle headlining arenas. With Williams’ fiery persona, the acrobatic back-flips during Pressure and the insanely popular Decode single from the Twilight soundtrack, there were times where it felt like they were the headliner. 

Debuting two songs from their upcoming brand new eyes album – Ignorance and Where The Lines Overlap – the night could have ended on Paramore and most people would’ve been happy but by the time No Doubt hit the stage there was no doubt (oddly enough, there was no pun intended there) on who the real headliner was for the evening’s performance.

Appearing behind a dropped white curtain, the band’s futuristic and spacious stage setting was revealed as they hopped straight into Spiderwebs. Dressed up in matching all white uniforms, No Doubt used the ideology of less is more to their advantage.  A massive, flat, all white stage covered the floor where the only change in decor was giant, multi-legged spaceship looking apparatus that held up Young’s drums and tour members Stephen Bradley and Gabrial McNair’s keyboards. It was definitely a sight to see as Stefani, Dumont and Kanal danced back and forth across the stage keeping in time with the two-toned melodies of their earlier stuff and energetically jumping alongside their newer material.

The all-white backdrop behind Young’s drum kick soon transformed from a sleek, solid white to videos that went along with the songs. Whether it was shadowy versions of the band skanking along in a deserted hallway as Stefani underwent a wardrobe change and the band treated the crowd to a fantastic ska instrumental, a collection of old tour videos took over during Running, or a Google Earth look at the crowd during Different People, the videos were always rather interesting and timed perfectly with the song. 

They may have had a close to five year hiatus, but by the looks of it, No Doubt hasn’t missed a step – assuming, of course, you ignore the fact that they forgot how to play Snakes when they tried to do it to fulfill a fan’s request.