Beach House Concert Review

Beach House concert review from House of Blues Cleveland on July 19, 2012.

The synthy-sultry-sleepy sounds of Baltimore, Maryland’s Beach House came rolling through town last night (Thursday; 07.19.12) at the House of Blues. Supporting the band’s fourth studio album, ‘Bloom,’ the follow-up to 2010’s stellar ‘Teen Dream,’ the duo consisting of Victoria Legrand and Alex Scally were accompanied by a full backing band. Together, they ran through an 18 song set that delighted the crowd for over an hour.

Only their second time stopping in Cleveland, the two seemed happy to be in the Rock ‘n’ Roll Capital. Legrand commented, “It’s nice that it’s not so crowded so you can all enjoy yourselves.” And enjoy ourselves we did! Victoria’s exquisite voice backed by the dreamy pop the duo cooked up in Baltimore is based on simple sounds of organ, keys, and guitars over drum loops. The sound has developed over the years and really fills a room like the House of Blues perfectly.

Drawing mostly from the band’s two recent albums, the night got off to a strong start with “Troublemaker” and “Wild” from the critically-acclaimed ‘Bloom,’ which was released earlier this year on Sub Pop Records. Scally and Legrand then moved on to one of the best tracks off ‘Teen Dream,’ titled “Norway.” The dreamy-synthy sounds filling the room had people bobbing back and forth, perhaps falling in love with strangers, or, perhaps lost in their own dream worlds as Legrand’s voice carried throughout the room, backed by a simple organ and/or drum beat.

“Other People” and “Lazuli” provided highlights early in the set, leading the way for older tracks and crowd favorites “Take Care” and the set closing “Zebra,” the latter being the first track on the aforementioned ‘Teen Dream,’ which first put the band on the map.

A short break led to a short three song encore that began with the band digging deeper into their catalog with a track from the 2008 album, ‘Devotion’ called “Turtle Island.” “10 Mile Stereo” and “Irene” capped off a rather surprising evening. Surprising in the sense that for as sleepy as the band sounds on record, they really bring a fun, electric, sexy vibe to the live setting. I feared the show would be somewhat of a sleeper, but, Beach House certainly proved my concerns wrong and left me wanting more as I walked out with the catchy, dreamy pop still ringing through my ears.

->FULL SETLIST<-

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