Last night was my inaugural Everest experience. I’d heard a handful of their songs online, but seeing a band live almost always casts it in a new light. For Everest, this is especially true. Their music fuses Neil Young-dusted Americana with a brand of ethereal indie. Granted, the less-than-great speakers on my computer maybe didn’t convey all the textures, but live I realized just how panoramic their sound is.
I got to The Echoplex just as Indie Check 1-Tuesday’s night was getting a proper intro. The Henry Clay People were on stage, bouncing around, hammering out song after song about that weird transition between post adolescence and adulthood, with equal parts heart and wit. They got the crowd riled and ready for what was next.
Everest came on, and the audience immediately grew. Everyone who’d been hanging out by the bar or waiting in the wings came up close. With 6 people (including 3 guitarists), the band easily occupied the large Echoplex stage. True to their sound, they began easy, nothing too mellow or too hard. Behind them, they were accompanied by a very cool visual: across a huge screen, artistically-rendered snow drifted over a mountain. The hypnotic huge-ness of it nicely mirrored what was happening on stage. Without much swinging or jumping, the band created full soundscapes around their otherwise straightforward songs. The visual and aural together lifted the set’s more lyrical, romantic tunes into something greater.
About a quarter of the way into the set, the singer brought out his friends, the Watson Twins (you may also know them as, well, The Watson Twins). For indie geeks, it was a big moment. They lent some pretty harmonies to the chorus of a song, before leaving just as quickly as they entered.
Typically I enjoy watching bands that are a little more energetic, but Everest didn’t need to be. In fact, it would’ve been kind of weird if they were all over the place. They peppered in just the right amount of upbeat songs to keep the set from stalling, and they seemed to be having a blast through all of it. The singer at one point even told the crowd, “This is just about the most fun I’ve ever had.”
And now, after seeing them, I can finally say that I — wait for it — conquered Everest.
B. Soika
www.loudvine.com
