On a day where one would be very comfortable spending it in a swimming pool with a cold drink, basking in the hot summer heat, what was dubbed as the “Colorado Tour” swung through Kansas City, Missouri. The Lumineers’ “Brightside” tour, featuring Daniel Rodriguez and Gregory Alan Isakov, eventually packed the T-Mobile Center in Kansas City, MO to full capacity. But this was not without it’s own set of issues.
Let’s go back to the beginning of the night, about an hour before the show started.
On arriving, there were no ques of people outside, waiting to get in. In fact, there seemed to be more people the previous week wondering around the Crossroads Art District for the First Friday’s Art Walk (which is located a few blocks south of the T-Mobile Center, across the I-70 bridges) then were waiting to get in. Now granted the fact that by the time I had arrived and had my waiver, the doors had been open and a good number of people had already entered into the venue for the night, but there were more than double the amount of people who were gradually walking up and going through the doors during the time that I was inside waiting for my escort down to the Center’s floor. At one point in time, the Westboro Baptist Church, who was there protesting the show across the street from the venue, seemed to have more people in their rough dozen protesters, than were people entering into the venue.
This lack of emotion or dedication rather to the show had its effects, namely on the opening act. When Daniel Rodriguez took to the stage to start off the night, the Center was virtually empty. Not as empty as it was for Classless Act when they opened up for Def Leppard and Motley Crue for the Stadium Tour at Kauffman Stadium a few weeks back, but it was close. The fans seemed to be more interested in getting drink than watching the Mr. Rodriguez and his band preform as the lines for those booths and to get merch around the concord were some of the longest lines I had ever seen at the venue.
Yet, Daniel did not let this bother him. His set was as heartfelt and enjoyable as any opening act could be. Playing in front of a black screen to hide the already built set of The Lumineers, the four piece band (which consisted of Daniel playing his acoustic guitar, a bass player, an electric guitar and a drummer) played with dim lights, which were great for his set, if you wanted to set a very indie mood and not really be able to see the artist preform.
The soft blues, which were almost better suited for a dive bar rather than a large concert venue, basked the entire group in a heard to see light. Yet, if one were simply there to listen to the show and not watch it as well, this would not have been an issue. The only other color that was seen in the set were reds and a soft spotlight, which either way, did not make for the best lighting to photograph in. Also, with the stereotypical “folk” hats, being either a fedora or a gaucho, made it nearly impossible to see the artist face because of the shadows that it created, which of course the lighting did not help at all.
Yet, after I was done with my allowed time to photograph, I ventured up to the top of section 106, to not only view the rest of the set, but also to try and gauge what the audience was feeling. The ladder is what caught my attention. By half way through Daniel’s set, the audience finally decided that their time at the merch and beer tables were done and that they should make their ways finally to their seats. This was sad because out of the two openers, Daniel was really good and could have flipped in the lineup with Gregory Alan Isakov and the show wouldn’t have been any different. This is an act that I would look forward to coming back to the Metro area.
All in all, their half hour set was a good one filled with a lot of great songs which included “Steal The Night Away”, “As I Am”, “Colorado”, “This is Life”, “Sojourn of a Burning Sun”, “Dolores”, and “Mixtape”.
Next on stage Gregory Alan Isakovy who was a bit more entergetic than Rodriguez’s set. The band once again played in a line in front of a black vale, with colored lights that would have worked better at a smaller, outdoor venue rather than a big arena; and this was not lost on the singer, as several times throughout his set he made comments about how the band was not used to playing in a “basketball place” but instead in much smaller venues, and stating “who knows, maybe we will play in a bowling alley” when they came through next.
While the lighting was slightly different than Rodriguez, it wasn’t different enough, casting long shadows on the performers’ faces and bathing them in a red, blue, green or white spotlight, from HIGH above.
(if you look closely at the top of the photo above, you can see the single colored light as it poured down on the stage)
But the band was more lively and energetic, I will say that. As the five piece band played, they introduced a melodic sound that filled the ears of everyone who was lucky enough to be in their seats by the time they took the stage. At one point in the show, there might have been either a lighting screw up (or maybe it was planned) where the band played for about 30 seconds in complete darkness. This wouldn’t have been an known issue if the lights had not been on for the start of a song, or even faded to black at the end, but no, the lights went out in the middle of the song. However, the band made up for this by displaying a four color strobe light show closer to the end of their set (the colors being the only ones that they had used to that point in the show; red, green, blue, and white). But with the set list of “Southern Star”, “Dark, Dark, Dark” “San Luis”, “Amsterdam”, “This Empty Northern Hemisphere”, “Liars”, “Caves”, “The Stable Song”, and “All Shades of Blue”, the 45 minute set was enjoyable. The highlight of the set though was “All Shades of Blue” as the band left their on-stage positions and gathered around a single mic, doing the song acoustic in a fashion that was fun to see, giving a throw back to their times in the smaller clubs that Gregory apparently wanted to be in.
One side note to say, about 3/4ths way through the set, the house lights briefly came alive to show a mostly packed arena. It appeared that the fans all finally had their merch and beer fills and were ready for the show. However, this was interesting to see, as when Gregory and his band were done, there was a half hour wait time between the time that they were done and the time that the Lumineers took the stage. Because of all of the heavy drinking that had happened during Daniel and Gregory sets, the lines for both the men’s and women’s restrooms were deep, in some cases maybe 50-75 people deep, just to get in. Unfortunately for some who were at the very back, because of the wait times to pass along all the beer that they had drank instead of watching the opening acts, they missed the opening of the band that they were there to see.
Just before the lights went down to start the show for the headliners, their was a buzz about the crowd, one that was different than most other shows that I have been to before. It was not an overly excited energy, nor was it a dull energy, but somewhere in between (closer to the dull though), yet it all changed as soon as the lights were dropped. A deafening roar from the crowd echoed through the interior as a 90+second introduction sequence to the band played, filled with the dropping of the curtain, and a video screen shaped like a sun slowly made it’s way down behind the drum kit, inching it’s way to the stage.
While openings like this have been done in the past, namely like Def Leppard, Tool, and Garbage to name a few, this one seemed different. Maybe it was because the audience, who were similar to that of the Dead South and Rev. Peyton’s Big Damn Band that played Grinders a week before in both look and music taste, or because of the band, where one might not expect a big theatrical opening to a Alt-Folk/Folk Rock/Americana band, which is based out of Denver, Colorado and founded by Wesley Schultz and Jeremiah Fraites, but more for the harder rock and roll acts. Regardless though, with influences such as Bruce Springsteen (who will be gracing Kansas City later in February of 2023), Bob Dylan and Tom Petty, one would expect nothing more than a superb night from the act. And that is exactly what the band delivered.
The stage was set up in a way that, from a overhead/birds-eye view, would resemble a house with two chimney stacks coming out from the top; and where the second floor/addict space a standing room only pit where one could access through two walk through tunnels that went under the stage ramps. This “roof top” like walk way enabled Wesley and Jeremiah to immerse themselves more into the audience than other acts that have previously been at the T-Mobile Center, minus the New Kids On The Block Mix Tape Tour where there was a main stage that had a runway, but also a secondary “B” stage that was only feet away from the sound boards on the other end of the arena’s floor which the artist on that tour performed on.
However, the stage, the way it was set up, allowed for not only the two members of the band to play their songs in the middle of the floor audience, but it also allowed for their backing band to be able to join them, and vice versa, such as it was when the band broke out into their third song of the night, the 2012 chart topping hit “Ho Hey” off of their self-titled debut album, which just happened to be celebrating the 10th Anniversary of it’s release this year.
The band’s two hour set, which included “BRIGHTSIDE”, “Cleopatra”, “Ho Hey”, “Angela”, “A.M. Radio”, “Dead Sea”, “Flowers in Your Hair”, “WHERE WE ARE”, “My Cell”, “Slow It Down”, “Charlie Boy”, “NEVER REALLY MINE”, “Gloria”, “Sleep on the Floor”, “Ophelia”, “Big Parade”, “Birthday”, “Rollercoaster”, the Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers cover “Walls (Circus)”, “Salt and Sea” (with guest Gregory Alan Isakov), and “Leader of the Landslide/You Can’t Always Get What You Want” was all that the crowd could hope for. The band kept the energy up the entire night, interjecting a few stories here and there, and a confetti drop that would rival that of a New Year’s Eve celebration.
However, that was not the end of the show. Shortly before 10:40, the band emerged back onto the stage with a four song encore. While an encore was to be hoped for after such a high energy, crowd pleasing show where the audience could just not say good bye to the band after the first 21 songs, the follow up of “Donna”, “Submarines”, “REMINGTON/REPRISE”, and “Stubborn Love” allowed the fans to get their one last drink of the band that was originally scheduled to make an appearance in Kansas City back in 2020, but due to the Covid virus had to reschedule not only once, but also another time in 2021, until they are able to swing back to their neighboring state in the unknown future.
One interesting side not to this concert, is that the show was presented by 96.5 The Buzz, an alternative rock radio station that went belly up in September of 2020, marking a two year blast from the past to those who listened to the once famous alternative rock station that came about in 2002 with the absence of 105.9 The Lazer out of Lawrence, which ended it’s alternative rock mainstay in 1998.
The Lumineers
Gregory Alan Isakov
Daniel Rodriguez
