It seems fitting on so many levels that the Final Four championship, aka March Madness, is being held in April. Southern March weather didn't really arrive until this month, and my March Madness series of concerts didn't really turn out exactly as I had anticipated, although it looks now as if the real madness is going to occur in April.
But I'm getting ahead of myself. Yesterday, as part of it's Final Four celebration, the NCAA promoted a series of concerts, really a mini-festival, in downtown Atlanta's Centennial Park. They kept this one quiet, and I didn't even hear about it until I learned at about 7:17 pm on Friday that My Morning Jacket were playing the park starting at 7:00. I didn't make that one, but while I was at the Caveman show on Saturday night, I was told that Sunday's lineup was going to open with Portland's Blind Pilot
I love this band and wanted very much to be a part of the audience, not so much for my own enjoyment but to show some support and appreciation for the band. I was worried that their often quiet brand of laid-back folk-rock wouldn't be well received by the audience, most of whom were probably there just for Sting and Dave Matthews later in the day, or at least for Grace Potter and the Nocturnals who were on right after Blind Pilot. But Blind Pilot are the kind of band with whom, after you've seen them in the right setting, you form a deep emotional bond with, and I wanted to get close to the front and send out some appreciative vibes as they played.
Turns out that getting to the front of the stage was tougher than I had anticipated. By the time I got to the park, 30 minutes before show time, there was already a line stretching around the block. It was a free show, but access to the park was tightly controlled for security reasons (all bags were inspected as the audience came through the gates). By the time I made it through the checkpoint, there were already about 15 rows of people standing in front of the stage, not to mention acres of people stretched out on blankets. However, I was able to work my way up to about the seventh or eighth row without too much difficulty or being too aggressive.
On stage, a d.j was working the crowd, and won me over when he threw Duck Sauce's Barbara Streisand into the mix.
Blind Pilot took the stage as scheduled right at 2:30 and almost immediately won over the audience. We last saw Blind Pilot at The Earl, where someone was blowing soap bubbles toward the band from stage left, but the really memorable performance was their record-release party for We Are The Tide at Portland's Crystal Ballroom during MFNW 2011 (on the 10th anniversary of 9/11 at that!). I've even got a podcast recording of a show of theirs earlier that day (thanks, KEXP!), a show I missed to go see The Joy Formidable at The Wonder Balllroom, and, yes, I'm listening to that MP3 right now even as I write this.
The weather was perfect, a sunny spring day with comfortable temperatures and low humidity. The crowd was reasonably attentive, except for a bunch of bros trying to jockey for a stage-front spot so they could see up Grace Potter's skirt during the next set and some frat boys behind me who were there simply to par-ty. But Blind Pilot was putting out such a warm, friendly vibe that none of this bothered me.
Whenever the Jumbotron projected the audience onto the screen behind the band, the crowd cheered jubilantly, confusing the band until they realized the reason for the sudden and unexpected bursts of enthusiasm. At other times,. the band seemed dwarfed by giant projections of their own performance.
Blind Pilot ended their set with their traditional closer, a triumphant rendition of We Are The Tide, the title song from their album.
Overall, it may not have been one of those perfect performances that would form one of those aforementioned deep emotional bonds for someone in the audience hearing them for the first time, but it was as fine and wonderful as one could hope for a show whose real purpose was merely to entertain basketball fans between games.
So, yeah, now this was the real March Madness, and the madness will continue through this week. Tonight (Monday), Chad Valley is playing at The Earl, and tomorrow night, Savoir Adore and On An On are playing at The Drunken Unicorn. Wednesday night, Scotland's Frightened Rabbit play at the god-forsaken Masquerade, and Thursday night, New Orleans' Hurray For the Riff Raff are at The 529. The weekend will bring jazz-rock guitarist John Scofield to Variety Playhouse, and Saturday there's the third annual Buddhapalooza up at the Barking Legs Theater in Chattanooga.
After Blind Pilot's performance on Sunday, I headed back home. I've already seen Grace Potter live, so I've checked that one off my bucket list already, and I wasn't going to hang around for Sting because it's not 1983 or for the Dave Matthews band because it's not 1993, either.
But, yeah, Blind Pilot on a really big stage in downtown Atlanta. For free. Now that was way cool.
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