Mute Math @ The Pageant (10/23/2009)

Remember the season premiere of The Office where Michael, Dwight, and Andy try to make a Parkour video, and Andy ends up getting hurt? Well, that could be me for the next week or so. Except instead of yelling "Parkour!" like an idiot, I'll be yelling "MUTEMATH!!1!". More on that later.

The show started off on a good note, as the first song by unknown (to me at least) As Tall As Lions appeared to portend a new surprise find. Sadly, though, this turned out to be their best song of the evening. The rest of their multi-instrumental performance wasn't bad, but it didn't inspire me to check out more of their music. A few of their songs had pretty interesting riffs and melodies, but the singer often appeared to be singing to a different song, as his key didn't quite match the music. Perhaps he did match, but I just wished that he had gone in a different direction.

The main performers made up adequately for the misfiring openers. They played a good mix of songs from both the first and the new albums, with their biggest hit, "Typical", showing up somewhere in the middle. It was during this song that we saw the first glimpse of the crazy acrobatics that these guys had up their sleeve, as Paul (the lead singer) started off the song by jumping off the top of his main keyboard stand. Some high moments included "Odds" (my favorite song off the weaker new album) and their first jam session, which was one of the best that I've seen live. It consisted mainly of a danceably furious pounding beat and some synchronized light work. It's too bad that their other jam sessions were more like the typical (pun intended) fare that most bands provide. They also had a few nice props, including a moment when Darren (the drummer) beat the first half of one of their songs on 4 virtual drums set up by the big screen.

By the end of the show, the guys realized that they had to prove that they are totally nuts. First, Paul did some hand/shoulder stands on his keyboard stand during one of the songs. And then on the very last song of the encore, which was announce as "Reset" but ended up segueing into "Break the Same", all hell broke loose. By the end of the song all of the following had happened:
(a) Paul hopped his keyboard stand
(b) Greg (the guitarist) walked on Paul's keyboard stand
(c) Darren took the bass drum to the crowd, had them hold it up, and then climbed onto it and stood up on it. After a few gestures indicating that we could not deny his supreme awesomeness, he hopped off it and back onto the stage.

So it's only natural that after the show I took every opportunity I encountered to hop off a railing, curb, chair, or some other furnishing in a manner that allowed me to practice my own brand of freestyle walking. And each time that I did it, I yelled out "MUTEMATH!!1!" in the spirit of "Parkour!". We'll see how long this fad lasts.

Oh, and I forgot to mention that Darren duct tapes headphones onto his head during the show. Crazy, I say!

4.2/5