3OH!3 concert review

About a month ago, yeah pretty late, I headed down to The Grog Shop in Cleveland Heights, Ohio to see 3OH!3. I'm a huge 3OH!3 fan so naturally I was excited about this show, a great band at my favorite club, who wouldn't be excited? Showing up about 5 hours early, my friend and I were the first two in line and after a few freezing hours, we grabbed our spots front row center and were blown away.

The first opening band, Cobra Conda, I didn't even know was on the tour, I had never heard of them before at all. In my last concert review I said that I had never danced so hard to an opening band as I did with Sing It Loud, well Cobra Conda quickly took that place. Their stage presence was amazing, two of the band members were dressed up in banana costumes, the other two were dressed as a farm and a cow. They tore the stage up, interacting with the crowd like I had never seen before. Graham, one of the front men would lean so far into the crowd he pretty much covered the first two rows. Cobra Conda doesn't have a full length album out yet and only three tracks on their myspace that can't compare to their live show but believe me when I say it: Cobra Conda will quickly become your new favorite band.

Following Cobra Conda was The Chain Gang of 1974, the only opener that I had been really excited to see but this is when the show was starting to get a little rough. The stage at The Grog Shop is only about a foot high, the sharp edge coming right in contact with your calves and knees, plus when people would start to push, you would lean forward you would fall directly on the stage. I think that The Chain Gang's set would have been better and much more enjoyable were they playing somewhere else. Despite the general painful overtone of the set, it was very good and they impressed me as far as just having a singer/bassist, a drummer and a laptop. I have been a fan of The Chain Gang of 1974 longer than I have liked 3OH!3 and honestly I wish I could say a whole lot more about their set but hopefully next time they come through a better venue choice could have been made.

The last of the opening acts was innerpartysystem. I had only heard one song by them but I had heard great things about them so I was interested to see how they were live. They sounded awesome live, their songs had a different feel and sound than the rest of the bands on the tour but in a good way. My only problem was I couldn't keep my eyes open during their set. They had such an extreme and over the top light show that it was honestly making me sick to my stomach to watch and I had to close my eyes and just listen for 90% of the set. I'll be seeing them again in January and while I'm excited to hear them live again, I'm hoping that maybe the light show will be toned down a little bit.

After much anticipation and knocked up knees, 3OH!3 finally took the stage. Immediately it was insane, they were all over the stage, the crowd was going insane and at times the crowd was louder than the performers were. While the show was amazing and they sounded great, their set felt very impersonal. At warped tour they were always jumping off the stage, over the barrier and in the crowd in every ones face. Here they would probably walk four feet or so from the edge of the stage, turn back and walk to the other side of the stage, that was probably the only thing that i was disappointed about the whole set. Afterwards, it seemed like a huge blur, I could hardly remember what songs they played, what order, what song I had gotten hit in the face during, it was like it had been erased from my memory and I had turned up sweaty, confused and kind of sore for some reason. All in all it was a great concert, it had it's few flaws that I was sort of unhappy about but I didn't let that ruin the night for me.


You can hear more from the bands on the tour here:
Cobra Conda:
http://www.myspace.com/cobraconda

The Chain Gang of 1974:
http://www.myspace.com/thechaingangof1974

Innerpartysystem: http://www.myspace.com/innerpartysystem

3OH!3: http://www.myspace.com/3oh3

-Tabitha Jones