Saturday night at The Blind Pig shared a diverse musical journey with Ann Arbor. Over the course of three acts, Horse Bomb, Odd Reality and The Goopies took the audience on a roller coaster ride of a show. Whether it was original songs or post-hardcore cuts from across eras of rock, the audience met each drop, twist and turn screaming with their hands up.
As the first act of the night, Horse Bomb set the chaotic tone of their set immediately. A rowdy cover of Radiohead’s “Creep” featuring an audience member transformed into a whirl of distorted noise for the song’s transition. The lights shone on the stage and the instruments — a guitar, drums and a keyboard — built off the crescendo at the end of their rendition.
The rest of their set continued with the same level of predictability — that is to say, none. Horse Bomb bounced around between crazy distortions, drum combos and heavy instrumentals. While at first hesitant to move to their sound, the audience started to buy in. A circle quickly formed in the pit as a crowd began to fill The Blind Pig. The energy was up, and the crowd was ready for the rest of the night.
Following Horse Bomb was Detroit post-hardcore group Odd Reality. Odd Reality has the unassuming, shtick-less look of all the best hardcore bands — they’re like those four guys you sorta knew in high school wearing the same old T-shirts and blue jeans, right up until the moment they start playing.
The opener, “Virtuous,” was explosive and effortlessly engaging; the mosh pit began to form before the first chorus hit. The energy started high with a barrage of thrashing post-punk and did not relent for the rest of the night. Following two more originals, “Fly Away” and “Afterglow,” rhythm guitarist and vocalist Mark Warren called out to the audience for the first time in the night: “Anyone here know Title Fight?”
Having scribbled some variation of “Title Fight influence?” roughly three times in my notes prior to this moment, I immediately joined the crowd in chanting “Shed! Shed!” unsure if I wanted them to play the entire 2011 album or simply its title track. In response, the quartet launched into a faithful cover of “Stab,” suitably bass-heavy and furious.
An unreleased original, “Let Me Out,” somehow crushed this high bar. The chorus was punchy and utterly classic, with guitars chugging and vocalists harmonizing. By the end of the song, one vocalist had lost his hat and the drummer had lost his shirt. If the set was not fully underway beforehand, it most definitely was now.
After another heartfelt Title Fight cover, Odd Reality introduced their next original, “Internal,” with the wry line, “if anyone has emotions you can relate.” Here, guitarist and harsh vocalist Brett Shannahan wore many hats, and well — he went from talk-singing to drop-jaw screaming to soloing, completely dominating the heavy shoegazey track. The audience was fully bought in, still moshing but now clapping along.
“The Anime Song” (written a week before and named such because they “couldn’t come up with anything else”) aptly sounded like the theme song to an early 2000s shōnen — nimble and hooky, the lead riff bouncing from guitar to guitar, ending with an ascending solo. Conversely, the finale, “I Got a Speeding Ticket on Rainbow Road,” sounded nothing like a Mario Kart song. It was spacey and resonant yet equally as captivating as the rest of their jam-packed set list.
While there was no encore, there was bigger news: Odd Reality’s latest single, “Let Me Out,” just dropped. Despite only having three singles currently streaming, Odd Reality plays with the confidence of a cult classic act. If they manage to cram even half their live energy onto a record, it’s going to be big.
Recovering from nearly an hour of moshing, the audience took a moment to breathe while the lights came up, revealing a sea of sweaty, smiling faces.
When The Goopies politely made their way on set, each member was wearing a different color neckerchief like an indie new-wave version of Sailor Moon. With little preamble, they began their set with an appropriately cheeky and plucky cover of XTC’s “Making Plans for Nigel.” Tragically, all three vocalists’ mics were just a bit too soft for the majority of the set, but they made up for it with sheer energy and charm. I’d seen The Goopies play before at a co-op party, and can confirm that they bring the same far-out authenticity to a living room as they do a venue stage.
Next, “She Don’t Use Jelly” by The Flaming Lips and Radiator Hospital’s “Cut Your Bangs” were made anew — stripped down, reharmonized and melodically reshaped but still similar enough to keep the crowd singing along. Between songs, the drummer drank water not from a plastic Dasani bottle but from a crystal glass mug straight from your grandmother’s cupboard.
Bassist Ruby Howard introduced their second original, “Sweet Dreams,” explaining that Sweet Dreams is a cat in an Annie Dillard novel (probably “Pilgrim at Tinker Creek”) and that she has been wanting a cat of her own for some time now. I’ll say this — if they release this song on Spotify, I will personally find her a cat out of gratitude. Slowed down and contemplative, it ended up becoming my favorite song of the set. All three vocalists sang low harmonies, and the guitars seemingly kept building toward some huge payoff, only to immediately sink back into twinkly quietude.
Overall, the set showed remarkable range, covering everything from an indie-pop Dear Nora deep cut to a funky ’70s dance-rock original about “rollerskating and friendship” in which the crowd was encouraged to do the twist. It’s clear that The Goopies are not beholden to narrow influences and will not be limited by genre boxes.
All of this built to the well-earned finale: a standout cover of Tom Tom Club’s “Genius of Love,” during which all band members (even the drummer!) were singing. The crowd was springing, meeting the band’s missed notes with wild cheers.
For the encore — the audience didn’t even let them leave the stage — The Goopies pulled out an older punk-flavored original called “Neuter,” complete with some ground rules: “Whenever we bark and stuff … you should bark and stuff.”
In a testament to The Goopies’ charisma, the audience howled like stray dogs until they left the stage, no questions asked. The barking continued until the lights beamed down on the audience. The audience was laughing, shouting and buzzing — everyone had the same thought: “What now?” The crowd gave one last roar as the Goopies shouted out the prior acts, and just like that, it was over. Through the different sets, the audience went on a journey across sounds, times and genres, and it was loud. At the end, the excitement manifested through the murmur of the crowd. Volume-wise, it paled in comparison to the music, but the joy of being in the moment for the show rang louder than any instrument, voice or audience ever could.
Senior Arts Editor Nickolas Holcomb and Daily Arts Writer Siena Beres can be reached at nickholc@umich.edu and sberes@umich.edu, respectively.
