By: Duncan Boyd –
Sean Yeaton of Parquet Courts. (Photo: Jason Hodgins/Aesthetic Magazine Toronto)
As Toronto continues to experience a record heat wave, can you possibly think of a better way to cool off than by attending a punk show amongst a crowd of sweaty and deliriously sunbaked Torontonians at the Horseshoe Tavern? Well If you agree you certainly aren’t alone as the venue filled up last night for Parquet Courts, who earlier this year released Light Up Gold, easily one of the year’s best punk albums thus far. Parquet Courts define their sound by jangly, wiry guitars and steadfast and piercing rhythms, complimented by an almost conversational vocal style from the band’s two vocalists. The songwriting of the Brooklyn four-piece, most notably that of band co-leader Andrew Savage, is both funny and understatedly smart. Light Up Gold contains songs about North Dakota’s baron landscape, the lack of careers available to young people these days, and of course getting stoned, among other things. They often sound pre-occupied with the mundane challenges of everyday life, though eager to confront them and find “soft waves of purpose” as Savage puts it on “Borrowed Time”. Thus, Parquet Courts were perhaps indeed the perfect band to turn to for a distraction while the heat has got us pinned down in an existential crisis.
The band hit the stage a little after 10pm, opening their set with two high-energy songs not featured on Light Up Gold, called “Wonderin’” and “Bodies”. The songs were fun and just as tight as anything you’d expect from the band, but it wasn’t until they powered into “Yonder Is Closer To The Heart” that the crowd truly got engaged and some friendly shoving ensued. “This thickness is just enough to wade through!” Savage bellowed on the song, as if specifically commenting on Toronto’s battle with the humidity. “Light Up Gold,” evidently another crowd favorite, followed “Yonder” up before the band moved into a few more unfamiliar, slower songs to complete the first half of the set. The band jammed for a very long time on a song called “She’s Rolling”, and though it was mostly engaging, the crowd was more than ready for more songs from Light Up Gold by the end of it.
The set really took off in the second half, where they played songs almost entirely of tunes from Light Up Gold. The energy level in the Horseshoe rose significantly when the band got into “Master of My Craft”, the album’s opening track. Co-leader Austin Brown took vocal responsibilities on the song, offering one of the band’s most quotable lines: “Socrates died in the fucking gutter!” By this point some crowd surfing and stage diving had begun. “Master” moved right into “Borrowed Time” during which Brown jumped into the crowd. Sweat was visibly dripping off the band’s hands, though concern for being hot was felt by no one. They also played a few more Light Up Gold songs including “Yr No Stoner”, “Careers In Combat”, and “N. Dakota”, before concluding with an extended version of “Stoned and Starving”. If everyone was a bit overheated and irritable this week, Parquet Courts certainly helped to relieve a bit of the tension, therapeutically sweating it out. Everyone appeared satisfied and carefree, if only for a minute, before the thickness would greet us again tomorrow.
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