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Something About the Air
When LAist showed up at The Hollywood Bowl last night to catch some fresh "Air", we didn't expect to find ourselves pleased with a pair of openers that we had yet to see perform live.
The first opener, Sondre Lerche, performed without accompaniment to great crowd reaction while the light was becoming scarce -- belting out a variety of haunting and melodic songs and finishing up with a small orchestra at his side. Following Lerche, the quirky Stereolab -- whose lead singer Laetitia Sadier danced and skipped her way through a variety of songs taking the opportunity to highlight some of their most recent creations off their new album "Margerine Eclipse."
But people were there last night to see French ambient-electronica band AIR, and when they finally reached the stage around 8:30 PM (Sondre and Stereolab took up the 6:00 PM to 8:30 PM time frame), the crowd made it known just how jazzed they were to be there.
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Although the previous opening acts had a small orchestra at their side, AIR went all out, filling the stage with a full orchestra who accompanied them on some of their most famous songs from "Sexy Boy", "Kelly Watch the Stars" and "People in the City" to "Cherry Blossom Girl" and "Alone in Kyoto" off their most recent offering "Talkie Walkie."
For fans of AIR, the most amazing part of the experience was their ability to recreate the pristine digital recordings of their CDs into a live performance that left nothing to be desired. These guys are amazing, right down to the perfect-pitch computer-generated singing voices. And with the string section accompanying them, there was really nothing left to be desired.
It was right about that moment, with nothing left to be desired, that Beck showed up to perform with AIR (see grainy picture above) on one of their five songs from their first and only encore.
Although AIR only performed for the Angelinos at the Bowl for about 90 minutes, it was a flawless 90 minutes that continues to guarantee French band AIR a rabid following on our shores and theirs. And if you haven't checked out their latest disc, may LAist recommend it?
You won't be disappointed.
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