Samiam/The Draft, 2 weeks later

Samiam/The Draft, live in Utrecht @ Tivoli de Helling, October 23 2006

I have a confession: I was never a big Hot Water Music fan. While I appreciated them, I never reached the level of veneration they seem to enjoy at punknews.org, and I've barely listened to their successor band, the Draft, at all. I also never got into Samiam that much, even though they seem to be the favourite band of the scene here in Utrecht, judging by buttons alone. Still, I enjoy both bands enough that the choice of whether or not to see them for a low price in a nearby venue was a rather easy one, and my rather ambivalent expectations were far exceeded by both groups.

Opening the night were Note To Amy, a local hardcore group who seemed to fit the style of the night pretty well. To a large extent, they played standard clean-vocals hardcore with all the standard trappings, but sported a significant Hot Water Music-esque emocore slant to their sound. Their set was decent enough, but pretty unremarkable other than the fact that their vocalist had a rather good voice. Still, they were decent if not exciting. The same can't be said of The Draft, who were up next. Though there was little obvious reaction from the typically restrained Dutch crowd, there was still a palpable air of excitement when they took the stage, and little encouragement was needed to get the crowd to move all the way forward (though a hole was left in front of Chris Wollard, prompting him to wonder several times if he stank). The band, after a short introduction and a “we hope you have as much fun as we do”, went straight into “New Eyes Open”, the start of a great set. They proceeded with energy and gusto, going through about nine songs within forty minutes. They were fairly focussed on the music, stopping only to make a few remarks on such subjects as Epitath and Gainesville; nothing interesting enough to repeat, really. But the music was well worth the focus – having listened to In a Million Pieces only a couple of times, I was amazed by the quality of the song I hadn't let sink in. The Draft are indeed a lot more melodic than their predecessor, but that doesn't detract at all from their intensity – they put on a very powerful, energetic and downright enjoyable show. I didn't get the setlist, but I know they played “Let It Go”, “Bordering”, “Longshot” and “Lo Zee Rose” (the closer) as well as the aforementioned “New Eyes Open”.

After the Draft went offstage, the scene was set for Samiam. By this time, the crowd was in full swing (or as much as can be expected from a Dutch audience, which wasn't really that much), so it was definitely a good thing that they took to the stage quickly and started with relatively little complication, though Jason Beebout made a pause to yell “Hello Czechoslovakia”, which got a bit less reaction than it warranted. They didn't hesitate before bursting out with “Sunshine”. The obvious instinct then was to compare them with the Draft, what with them being right after one another and playing fairly similar styles. There was a fairly marked sense of differentiation between the two, which boiled down to the Draft being more energetic and aggressive, while Samiam were more melodic and emotive – basically, Samiam felt more mature. That doesn't mean they lacked energy or force, though – their set was captivatingly intense from start to finish, as they went through 14 songs with even less of a pause than the Draft had given. There weren't reallt any interesting antics or happenings to report, just a good solid set, including such standouts as an exceptionally desperate-sounding “Mud Hill” and of course the only charting single Samiam released, “Capsized”. The band was fairly static throughout, unfortunately, so the kinetic energy of the set was a bit lower than it could have been. One of the better moments of the show came when the time came for their encore, when Johnny Cruz came out alone, prompting Draft drummer George Rebelo to yell “Drum solo!” from the audience, at which point Jeremy Bergo, who had joined Cruz on the stage, grumbled “no one asks for a bass solo...” Alas, no solo was forthcoming, only a three-song encore. It still provided a good end to a good show.

Samiam setlist:

Sunshine

Factory

Bad Day

She Found You

Mud Hill

Get It Right

Come Home

Stepson

No Size That Small

Take Care

Capsized

Mexico

Dull

Full On

Encore:

When We're Together

Wisconsin

Super Brava