...are foverer

i'm sure i've talked to you about islands before. i've seen them twice already in concert. last time however, was a while ago in september 06. this was shortly after their first full-lenght had come out. the press gave it great reviews as far as i remember. anyway, they hadn't toured in a long long time and they were saying a new album was on its way. a few weeks ago they posted a number of shows in europe. but last week, to my great surprise, walking by a venue, there i saw a poster announcing islands on saturday. the show was meant to give its fans a preview of the new record.

the opening act were the two asian members of islands. i think they used to call themselves the super chow brothers but now have no actual band name to speak of. they are not in fact, brothers, but they do share the same name. anyway, i'm sure you would have liked their set. they are both talented violonists and played 3 classical songs from a composer i sadly am unaware of. the crowd was cheerful enough, but clearly this was unexpected for an indie-rock show.

when islands took the stage, we noticed frontman nick diamonds had painted his face white. my boyfriend says he looked like a mime. he is very thin and his face is strong-boned, so he had a weird ghostly vibe going, too.

islands are 6 guys. other than the two asian fellows, nick, and the black bassist, one of them i used to recognize as the saxophone guy. both times i saw islands, he always exhumed so much energy on stage. he takes heavy steps forward when he plays and his teeth seem to be clinching onto his sax as if he was dangling from a cliff.

it seems now that sax guy (to be noted that he's also in local band sister suvi) is playing guitar more than sax. it looks like there won't be as much sax on the new album, because the only times he played it, was for older songs from their first lp. and that's not such a bad thing. nick diamonds and him have a great chemistry when they play together and along with the low bass, it makes for some really great stuff. they have a new song up on myspace if you want to have a listen. (on a new label, btw).

overall, it was yet another different islands experience. i discovered them 3 years ago at a big venue opening for metric. i knew none of their songs. the second time i saw them was during the osheaga music festival. i, one fan who could now sing along, amongst a mass of indie kids. this time, i knew the older songs. they played the new songs with such conviction that it got me convinced that i was witnessing an incredibly talented band. i admire nick for putting on such a great performance.

stat!