Even though I had to stand for the entire set (plus two encores) of the sold-out Pixies show last night, it was a truly wonderful experience. I saw them at an outdoor venue in Vancouver about six years ago on the second round of their reunion tour, but the band then (or at least Charles and Kim) gave off the impression that they were there mainly to make money and not to enjoy playing together again. But this time, they had quite a nice stage set up with these round fabric covered lit spheres above them (quite similar to the ones Sigur Rós had when I saw them in Montreal) that changed colour to match the videos that were made specifically for each song to play behind the band (the tour is a bit of a concept, where they play Doolittle in it's entirety and in the order it is on the album, plus B-sides). Plus, Kim Deal was all smiles and the song was rather good. The most entertaining song production-wise was the last song of the first encore, "Into the White", which begun with this gigantic white puff of smoke from the stage that completely obscured the band from sight and slowly drifted into the crowd (masking the many individual puffs of non-medicinal smoke arising from the crowd) until, simultaneously, the song ended and we could finally see the abandoned stage. Brilliant.
Anyway, with my bum leg, I was left to guard our seats in the bleachers before and after the opening band, and so I had quite a fun time people watching. A Pixies show crowd is very eclectic, to say the least, with the age range going from about 8 to 60. There were hipsters (young and old), hippies (young and old), metal heads (young and old), people who think they're punk (young and old), girls in high heels guarding their boyfriends (young and old), and everyone in between (including those people that just seem like they've made it their lot in life to go to every concert possible). I'm not a huge fan of street style blogs, but I think just taking photos of Pixies fans at every show would make for a very interesting blog (though cameras weren't allowed into the venue, hence why no photos here). Also, I think that many female Pixies fans would find something to like in Obakki's F/W 11 collection*, presented last Thursday at Vancouver's gorgeous St. Andrew's Wesley Church. Which makes me wonder what a Pixies show in a church would be like...
(Photos via Obakki's Facebook, by Peter Jensen)
*Yes, I realize this is a bit of a contradiction to my previous post about Obakki, and so I will state that I'm not suggesting Pixies fans should wear these pieces to a Pixies concert per se. Those knits would soak in the smoke from fellow fans in the mosh pit anyway, making an Obakki-clad fan smell rather guilty...
