Passion Pit

Passion Pit played in Santa Barbara last night and I went with my brother as we're both big fans. It was on at the Granada Theatre, a beautiful theatre downtown that reminded me of the Isaac Theatre Royal in Christchurch but wasn't as big. It was seated, of course, which was a little disappointing because we got our tickets last minute so were in row T. Turns out it was a pretty small place and we were pretty close to the stage anyway.
There were three opening acts before PP came on, and one of them had Michael Cera as the bassist. I had no idea he was in a band, called Mister Heavenly, but they actually turned out to be quite good. He was predictably awkward, dressed in brown courduroys and a too tight white polo. At the start of the set he said Santa Monica instead of Santa Barbara and possibly out of embarrasment spent the rest of the set facing the back of the stage. His band was a pretty generic four piece skinny white boy indie rock kind of deal apart from the keyboardist who was about 35, podgy with a shaggy 70s do and handlebar moustache who interupted the lead singer every now and then with deep throaty yells and random lyrics.
The other opening acts were good too, local bands with a sound quite similar to Passion Pit's. I hadn't had much sleep the last couple of nights cos I've been sick and by this point my eyelids were getting droopy and I was doing all I could to stay awake for PP.
As soon as they hit the stage I had no problem staying awake. I'd seen PP before, about 11months ago at the Big Day Out. They were good but the outdoor stage and fairly shitty quality of sound of the BDO didn't do them any favours. Seeing them in a proper theatre with their lights show and everything was outstanding.
PP is one of those rare bands that sounds exactly the same live as recorded, and they were amazing. It could have something to do with the fact that a lot of their songs have digital components that are easy to replicate live but lead singer Michael Angelakos' voice is so incredibly unique and very real.
They played for just over an hour and then came back on for a three song encore, and playing Sleepyhead to finish.
There was no flash photography allowed so my photos are..average but I will post some anyway, even though they don't capture quite how amazing it was.