Show Reviews

Over the past few weeks I’ve been mentally preparing myself to write a bad review of The Police at Madison Square Garden. Every critic and blogger was all over these guys for changing the sound of a few tunes and playing the same songs every night. The first shows of the tour sounded mediocre at best and had me doubting their reunion. But I’m glad to report that last night The Police showed the sold-out crowd why they were once the greatest band in the world.

Coming home is a theme that many novels, plays, and songs often visit. Maybe even the proverbial "Prodigal Child" has to take a break from the road. Then again, maybe all those people's children raised on the road or who escape like Walt Whitman to the open road meet at a place like 10,000 Lakes.

If taking eleven years off helps a band's sound as much as it did for Crowded House, perhaps every band needs to take an extended hiatus. Crowded House returned to New York City for the first time since 1996 on Thursday night for a brilliant performance at the Masonic Lodge. The band played in the stately Grand Lodge, a room better known for housing meetings of the usually secretive Free Masons than as a venue for a rock band.

“It’s a rock album,” says guitarist and lead vocalist Sam Prekop of Everybody, the first new release from The Sea and Cake in more than four years. The band’s recent show at Webster Hall in New York was a testament to that statement, as the indie-pop heavyweights demonstrated an active presence with a room-filling sound that listeners may not collect from their studio recordings.