Interpol was once a post-punk band. Their first two records, 2002’s classic Turn on The Bright Lights (Matador) and 2004’s Antics, showed a reverence for 80s post-punk pioneers such as Joy Division, as well as the ability to build upon this influence. But recently, Interpol has lost that urgency, releasing two tepid, more radio friendly alternative rock albums including last year’s Interpol (Matador). So before their show at the House of Blues last Saturday, I wondered which Interpol would show up: the energetic one or the listless one. Regrettably, it was the latter.
Opening for Interpol on this tour was the lifeless School of Seven Bells, whose brand of dark dream-pop, which is reminiscent of Cocteau Twins meets old U2, is much more suited to headphone listening than to the multi-tiered House of Blues. Their set lacked much to draw the audience in, which set the mood for the entire night.
Interpol came on and opened with “Success,” one of the few highlights from last year’s self-titled effort. The performance was uninspired with the energy of the song never really coming across. Second came a sped-up version of the frantic “Say Hello To The Angels.” The tempo change did nothing to increase the intensity of the song, but rather gave the impression that the band was just rushing to get the song over with.
Interpol seemed bored the entire show. This malaise spread onto the audience, which rendered the show lifeless almost from the start. The pacing of the set was terrible, with blocks of low energy sounds bogging the show down. Before the last song of the main set, a version of “PDA” that seemed as if the band was merely going through the motions, Paul Banks said that this was the last show of the tour, and thus, the best. This seemed like a rather dubious claim. It appeared that Banks and the rest of the band were concentrating more on the next few weeks off than the show that night.
Even more disappointing is that the set-list suggested that this might have been a great show. Over half of the 17 song set came from Interpol’s first two records. This included hits like “Evil,” but also deeper cuts like “Length of Love” and “Not Even Jail.” The few moments of crowd liveliness came from these tracks off of Antics, which proved to be the clear fan favorite.
After “PDA” the band left the stage for the traditional rock star encore break. I’ve never heard a crowd so quiet during a break than the crowd on Saturday night. It was a miserable few minutes with Interpol finally returning for a few more dull performances. They had already lost the crowd an hour before.
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