Reviews aren’t really my thing. I don’t like ‘em and they always leave me feeling as though the recommendations given through them are arbitrary and useless. That is why this isn’t going to be a real review but more of me reciting a recent experience of mine to you. It was exactly a week ago last Tuesday when I saw mewithoutYou, TouchÌ© AmorÌ©, Seahaven and Caravels at the Black Cat. This is going to be 90% about mewithoutYou but here’s the 10% run down on the rest of the show. Caravels played first. I missed them because a slice of Italian Pizza Kitchen pizza was calling my name. I have no regrets there. I hear they were good if anyone really cares to know. Second was Seahaven, who sounded a little muddy whether that be the sound guys problem or the band’s I’m not sure, but despite that I still thoroughly enjoyed them. Although they did pick a weird acoustic song for their closer and the crowd delicately wasn’t feeling it making for an awkward end to the set. Now for my personal gripe with tour as a whole/current trends. TouchÌ© Amore played last and frankly that was lame and weird and made me infinite amounts of sad simply because mewithoutYou are amazing and totally more than deserve the headlining spot. Maybe it‰’s a seniority thing (MWY has been around a good 7 years longer than TA) or maybe it‰’s my distain for anything currently hyped, but I wasn‰’t into it. Because of the current trend landscape these days the tour was doing a switch off the headliner each night kind of thing since all the kids like TouchÌ© Amore. I guess it does make logistical business sense which I’m all for and TouchÌ© are a fantastic band in their own right, but still I would have liked to see more people excited for mewithoutYou; I think that‰’s truly where my aggravation lies. I saw TouchÌ© AmorÌ© open for AFI the last time they were in town and they did such a good job holding their own opening for such a major band, I was proud to be fan of theirs that night, but coming off the heels of mewithoutYou, TouchÌ© paled in comparison. This is part personal problem part jealously that the crowd never stopped moving for TA but MWY most stood still with the exception of a few devoted fans. Few of my friends can relate to me on this so maybe it was just me. Enough about this! On to the part where I sob in my bed writing this as I recount the glorious experience of seeing mewithoutYou.

Admittedly I don’t listen to mewithoutYou very often; for me they‰’re more of a palette cleanser when I’m sick of everything else since they sound nothing like everything else. I think the fact that before the show I wasn’t as into them as much as I have been with other shows I’ve loved just as much as this one. It’s impressive because when you go to a show and you know every lyric to every song inside and out the band could sound horrible and it’s still amazing but with mewithoutYou they impressed me despite me not knowing 75% of their catalogue. Side note: I have a tendency to pick a record from and artist and run it into the ground and pretend they’ve never made anything else: for mewithoutYou it‰’s their first full length through and through. ANYWAYS, this ability to make me care about something I’ve never actively listened to, in the moment I’m listening to it live, is a trait few bands possess. And I‰’ve honestly never seen it done as good as this. I have a favorite live band and they hold 2 of my top 3 favorite live sets I‰’ve ever seen, that band was Against Me! That was until I saw mewithoutYou and they pushed Against Me! out of the top 2 spots and Baltimore‰’s Mindset completely out of the top 3 running. Against Me! sound exactly like their records when they play live, Mindset blow most other hardcore bands out of the water as far as sounding tight goes, but mewithoutYou? They somehow made me feel so emotionally distraught and confused yet unequivocally happy at the same time that I could have cried if I wasn‰’t so entrenched in what was happening on stage. They sounded perfect. Every intricate detail in every song could be heard. They‰’re everything I want from a live show. They‰’re energetic and weird and beautiful and you can almost feel how much they love being on stage as much as their fans love watching them. I haven‰’t felt that way since I was 14 and heard Copeland for the first time and literally fell head over heels in love. And to top it all off, the vocalist had various tambourine-like instruments and even pulled out an accordion making everything even cooler. I wished it could have lasted forever. The whole set felt like 10 minuets and I would gladly have paid the price of admission 3 times over to watch it again immediately after.

I can only wish that one day everyone could feel that same unwavering feeling of heart stopping love. Well that was cheesy, but oh so true and sincere. I’ve been known to be a bit bitter and unforgiving when it comes to being judgmental, but when it comes down to it I don’t care if you love Avril Levine more than life itself or if you worship at the feet of Grizzly Bear, but I do care if you ever get to experience that magical feeling when you listen to an artist. And if you have, you‰’re cool in my book. I don‰’t know how to end this because I could talk about it forever and this has gone on too long already, but if you ever get the opportunity to see mewithoutYou take it because I guarantee its worth it.