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Manchester Orchestra Celebrate Album Anniversary at Brooklyn Steel

Manchester Orchestra – Brooklyn Steel – December 7, 2019

Manchester Orchestra’s album Mean Everything to Nothing is one that, frankly, rocked my world. I was into emo, but this was something else entirely—the Beach Boys harmonies, the delirious Catholic guilt, the visions of dead lovers and car crashes? I was used to yearning: This was the abyss at its widest yawn. This was a world in which God was freshly gone, and the left behind were let loose to enact their petty, desperate dramas. I was into it. Freaked out but also into it.

At a sold-out Brooklyn Steel on Saturday night, lead singer Andy Hull described Mean Everything to Nothing as “the little album that could.” Prior to its release in spring 2009, Manchester Orchestra were a quieter band, a slightly sleepy indie outfit cooing about private hurts. But on this album, they were wide-awake, and adrenaline was coursing through burly guitars and shrieked vocals. The band was reborn. This album was massive, and it propelled Manchester Orchestra to new and towering heights.

There are some things you can get at an emo concert that you simply cannot get anywhere else. Other genres may also have energy, but there’s nothing quite like the frenetic, shaky energy of a thrashing emo guitarist. This tour, which commemorates Mean Everything to Nothing’s 10th anniversary, is the first time they’ve played deeper cuts like “Tony the Tiger” and the first time in awhile they’ve played songs like “100 dollars.” There are a lot of concerts these days in which acts implore the audience to “open up the pit,” but when Hull started screaming, “I am fine/ I just need a hundred dollars,” he didn’t have to ask. The moshing was drawn from an overwhelmed crowd, a seamless and organic system.

As someone who’s nearly always wondering if he’s acting weird, this was a refreshing reassertion of concert etiquette: screaming the lyrics along was not only compulsory, it couldn’t be stopped. —Adlan Jackson | @AdlanKJ

Photos courtesy of Joe Papeo | www.irocktheshot.com

The Front Bottoms/Manchester Orchestra – Brooklyn Steel – December 14

Jersey’s the Front Bottoms and Atlanta rock outfit Manchester Orchestra teamed up to kick off a sold-out two-night run at Brooklyn Steel with a crowd-pleasing high-energy show on Friday night.

Touring behind their fifth studio album, A Black Mile to the Surface, Atlanta four-piece Manchester Orchestra stopped off in NYC to play Terminal 5 on Friday night.

Photos courtesy of Joe Papeo | www.irocktheshot.com