Bright Eyes @ History

Bright Eyes @ History

. : : April 10th, 2025 : : .

I've seen Bright Eyes a couple of times in the (somehow) distant past, some eighteen years ago, and my memory of them is faint and fuzzy at best.

As someone who fell in love with Lifted...or the Story is in the Soil album, juuuuuuust before the band blew up big with their I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning album, I remember being really excited to see them live and leaving really disappointed.

The band was known for wild, energetic, and chaotic performances that teetered on the edge of being an incoherent mess, but which side it leaned towards on any given night seemed to depend on front man Conor Oberst's sobriety (or rather, the lack thereof).

The two shows I saw in Toronto I remember as being fine, if perfunctory, and really lacking in emotion -- an odd thing to say about a band that is synonymous with the emo genre.

Known for set lists that span the entire musical catalogue of one of the more prolific songwriters of our generation -- no b-side, limited release, split single, or rare EP song was ever off the table -- I still lucked out with actually pretty decent set lists. But somehow, I never connected with the live performance in the way I connected with the recordings.

After the better part of two decades, curiosity (and a great touring support act!) led me to give them a third chance, and ... well...

I left feeling like the performance was fine, if perfunctory, and somewhat lacking in emotion.

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Cursive @ History

Cursive @ History

. : : April 10th, 2025 : : .

I seemed to almost will the Cursive - Bright Eyes double bill into existence.

Excited by the well-received new album by the band, Devourer, I was hopeful for another Canadian tour date (the band had a long border-crossing sabbatical from 2012 through 2022). One day, quite randomly, I also thought about how long it'd been since I'd seen Bright Eyes, and curiously peeked at Setlist.FM to see what recent shows have looked like. "Yeah, they might be cool to check out again when they tour here next," I thought to myself in a wave of early 2000's nostalgia.

When it was announced a week or so later that not only were they both hitting Toronto this spring but were on the same bill, I was immediately all-in.

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Cursive @ Horseshoe Tavern

. : : March 31st, 2012 : : . The difference between Cursive‘s performances in Buffalo at Mohawk Place and in Toronto at the Horseshoe Tavern could hardly have been more night and day. And no, not…

Cursive @ Mohawk Place

. : : March 30th, 2012 : : . In university, I fell in love with Cursive. Hot on the tails of The Ugly Organ album, the follow up to their scorching hit, Domestica, the albums…

Cursive @ Tralf Music Hall

. : : July 31st, 2009 : : . Friends had been encouraging me to get into Cursive for some time by the time I actually came around and eventually fell in love. Most…