For some reason, it seems that Richard's can never open its doors quite on time. The line outside steadily grew, the linees cold and wet from a rainy, early Vancouver night. Almost half an hour late, the wooden doors swung open to admit its patrons, and after another lengthy wait, opener Patrick Park was ushered into the room (from a van out front where he had previously been sitting) by the promotional staff and led away into the back room of the club. Following this, it again took some time before he finally hit the stage, and by that time, I was certainly ready for him.

I'd been anticipating Patrick Park's return since a previous failed attempt of mine. I approached the stage to take in what he had to offer, and admittedly was a bit concerned for the first fifteen minutes or so of his set. The room wasn't nearly at its full capacity for the night, which always seems to impact the effect the opening bands have. I suppose the audience and its reaction and involvement play a pretty huge part in the stamp the bands leave on someone. As I wandered back and forth during that first while, Park was alone on stage with an acoustic guitar. He spoke very infrequently between songs, and seemed to be rushing himself. The song tempos felt off, a bit in the way a child might scurry nervously through a music recital. His voice sounded odd, hollow, a bit weak, and indeed off key a number of times. Having heard some of his recorded music, I was ready to write this off as "just a bad night."

After two songs, two people joined him on stage. The drummer was the girl who had previously been taking care of the merchandise booth near the back of the room, and the other, a bassist. Still, the tempo, though through songs that seemed like they should have been very mellow and relaxed, felt tense and hurried. The lights did not change overhead, and the lack of action on stage caused my eyes to drift to the back of the stage, to notice that large, cut-out snowflakes still adorned the brick wall behind the musicians.

The fifth song though, snapped me back into the show that was happening in front of me. By this time, a few people from the crowd had drifted forward, taking initiative to approach the stage, and had sat themselves cross-legged around the floor in front of the standees. More and more people joined this living-room-like scene, just as the set began to pick up and evolve into something truly incredible. Perhaps it was the audience's sudden approach and deeper interest in the music that sparked Park to take his performance up a few notches, or perhaps he just became more comfortable in general. Maybe he was just playing better songs suddenly, but beginning with "Silver Girl," this went from a sleepy open-mike night to a fully-involved work of art.

The songs were still basically mellow, but they kicked into high gear frequently, with Park now stomping his feet around the stage floor, his voice becoming rich and layered and strong. The drums were played with vigour behind him, the spectators sang along, and everything just became better and better as the set progressed. It called to mind a bit of Pete Yorn, but bluesier. Some songs were a lot of bluesy. A tune called "Past Poisons" was a huge standout of the show, and shortly, he ended the suddenly-spectacular set.

I'd say over all there was far more good than mediocre here. Again, I'm not certain what it was that kept the set from starting off as superbly as it ended, but Patrick Park proved himself to be a consummate performer, and I have to say, I look forward to seeing more from him in the future.

As the sets changed over, the seated crowd behind me got to its collective feet and rushed forth, ensuring that the spot I was standing in would be the only spot I'd be standing in for my shoot of the Thrills. The mic stands were placed, including one oddly-short mic that was inserted directly into a receptacle in an elaborate pedal board. The set lists were taped down by each band member's future spot, and myself and another photographer noticed with strange delight that, written directly on each list, was a note about the encore, indicating that its presence (which included their hit, bla bla) was "depending." Whether that was depending on time, or on the audience reaction was unknown.

A couple minutes before the band hit the stage, an unnamed fellow came out and, in his heavy Irish accent, began to rile up the crowd with an airline-steward-esque explanation of the nearest safety exits, and how just because they may be in the face of catastrophe, there's no reason the audience members shouldn't still share the love and hold hands as they exited the room in an orderly manner. For some reason, he then launched into a flaming version of "Ice Ice Baby," complete with barely-acceptable rapping and a lot of silly poses. It was completely absurd, it made no sense at all, and it was extraordinarily hilarious.

It was also probably the greatest thing about the Thrills' set.

Now, I'm not saying that the Thrills are a bad band. Far from it, in fact. They are really quite a good band, that I've enjoyed hearing in the past. But partially from the underdog-turned-victorious quality of Park's set, and partially from the unstoppable Vegas-show performance of the mysterious guy who introduced the Thrills, this was disappointingly not engaging.

It was a bit odd, actually. Usually I find the music pretty on par, and the show itself falling flat, but this one was the opposite. The stage presence was pretty flamboyant. There was a mountain of energy spewed forth by singer Conor Deasy, who ran madly around the stage in his striped shirt and leather jacket, whirling the crowd into massive acoustic clap-alongs quite frequently. He climbed on top of many a speaker and bar top to get peoples' asses in gear and join in the fun, and it worked for the most part. Guitarist Padraic McMahon bending over almost double to sing into his short microphone looked a bit awkward, but if I recall correctly, the height of the stand was adjusted partway through the set.

Somehow though, it was the music that sounded out of place. It was just lusterless. While the songs were quite glowy and rollicking (well-suited to clap-alongs), almost reminding me of something like a Brit-rock version of ABBA at times, they were played akin to a sleep-talker. Like the crystalline stars that should have been blazing strong through the set were instead viewed through a dingy screen door. The physical energy was there, and the music itself would be well-suited to a swanky dance party, but it was all presented quite flatly. They just forgot to polish everything up before throwing it out there. The songs were fairly short and to-the-point, mostly, it seems, existing only for their feel-good nature. This was also the last night of their tour, so perhaps they were just worn out. The audience seemed divided on the impact of the show. Some people took off early because they just weren't digging it, and others stayed packed to the front, clapping to the very end. I stayed for the full show, but just didn't find myself desiring to pay extremely close attention to the whole thing. Again, good songs, they just need a good hard push when performed live.

Oh, and they did do their encore. Brava!

Elsewhere

By Andy Scheffler
Photos : Andy Scheffler
Published : April 22, 2004.