For my money, The Hold Steady was the Buffalo show of the year until Monday night's Black Keys show at Buffalo's Outer Harbor site with The Joy Formidable. They might still be Buffalo show of the year had there been more than 500 people at Canalside due to dubious weather, severely limiting the band's impact and robbing them and us a mass transcendent experience. Monday night's show however came together perfectly, and at last, the Outer Harbor lived up the hype.
The Joy Formidable got things started right with an thrashing, electrifying set that riled up the growing crowd up front and mesmerized the crowd back by the beer tents. I knew we were in for some powerful stuff when I saw that the drum set up was to the side of the stage instead of near the rear, and the Welsh band delivered in spades, with drummer Matthew James Thomas jamming out and communicating directly to bandmates Ritzy Bryan and Rhydian Dafydd Davies (the Welsh are the best), who were busy bewitching me with some wonderful vocal harmonies. They were the perfect opening act for The Black Keys. The crowd absolutely loved them, I loved them, and their explosive set kind of reminded me of the Keys show at the Town Ballroom in 2010, where hopefully we'll get to see them again as headliners.
After a tastefully short interregnum, Dan Auerbach and Pat Carney came out to a properly rapturous welcome and positively tore through a set heavy on their most recent LP's, 2010's breakthrough Brothers and 2012's El Camino, with a few older cuts sprinkled throughout for their longtime fans. "Howling For You" kicked things off and set the tone for the evening with it's naked longing and rowdy sing-a-long chorus that instantly swept the crowd up and established the group mind meld that prevailed for the rest of the show, even when they brought out their additional musicians for a few numbers throughout the set. I would have to attribute that to the fact that the focus never comes off of Auerbach and Carney thanks in no small part to their profound energy and workingman's ethic of working for that dollar. They didn't take it easy in the least, and the crowd properly appreciated and responded to their energy in kind.
Still, one of the highpoints of the night came when Auerbach (Can I call him Auerbach? I'm calling him Auerbach) said that we were "like a mini Lollapalooza out there," which was frankly a lovely thing to say, and more importantly, a fine idea to consider. No, not a three day indie music blow out (not yet at least), but that Outer Harbor site is crying out for a solid one day music festival. They've got the Port-A-Cans, they've got the food trucks, that stage is dynamite, that ground is nice and Bonnaroo soft, and hot damn that would be nice. Maybe next year. Auerbach also scored when he asked the crowd if the Old Pink has the best steak sandwich, further establishing his Buffalo and old smoothie bona-fides with his rather large congregation.
By the time things came to a head with raw and unflagging jams on "Tighten Up" and "Lonely Boy," the scene was one of people either ecstatically jamming out or contentedly blissed out to the powerful vibes being laid down by the guys from Akron, Ohio in a properly Rust Belt post industrial tableau, and everything just seemed right... like this was why they're doing shows on that site in the first place, and it was all good. The obligatory encore, a gritty and nasty shredding of Attack and Release's "I Got Mine" sent the crowd home on their death marches back to their cars happy, and with joy in their hearts (believe me, I had time to gauge reactions during my death march).
If the last ten years has seen Buffalo emerge as genuine Springsteen country, then the last three have done the same for The Black Keys, as the band has moved in that short period from playing to 450 people at the Town Ballroom to Artpark in 2011 and culminating Monday night at the Outer Harbor. The Black Keys proved that they are indeed true Rust Belt compadres; good people, hard working dudes, and soulful bluesmen who've turned it up to 11 to set themselves, and us free.
video by DarkKnight127
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