venue: bimbo's
artist: stars & lloyd cole
who: alex, andrew, betty, ro, lou, jen & jonathan
when: 14 nov 2007 (wednesday)
doors open at 7p
while i was just at bimbo's no more than 5 days before the stars show, i hadn't seen torquil campbell perform since the memphis show which was earlier this year in may. not too long ago. having two doses of the torq is quite nice actually. another wouldn't be too bad.
torq campbell started off as a child star and still works as an actor. i saw him on sex & the city. he was also on a couple of law & order episodes, which i love love to watch. it makes me like him even more. hardly possible. anyway, more about torq later.
we get there and there are flowers all over the stage. not on the floor but on their instruments sticking out where ever flowers could stick out. lloyd cole opened the stars show. he used to sing with the commotions (i think). he went solo in the early 90's and i actually have his album (don't get weird on me, babe). there's this one song that i loved. it was why i bought the cd. it was called she's a girl and i'm a man. very catchy. alas, he didn't play it. however, he did play are you ready to be heartbroken? in which camera obscura (ro reminded me of this) has a song called lloyd, i'm ready to be heartbroken based off lloyd cole's song. cool, huh? i was really impressed with lloyd cole. even after all these years, he still really rocks. and doesn't look too bad either.
now, this is my fourth time seeing stars. and they just get better and better every time i see them. the thing you don't hear on the album is torq's passion. he sings with overwhelming passion that you can almost see it ooze out of him on the stage. he's jumping around and so completely into the music. he's also very funny and uber cool. both alex and i decided that we love him. words cannot describe the extent of his coolness. also, amy millan has one of the loveliest voices. i adore her voice. and at first, she didn't stand out quite as much as torq but you can tell she got more comfortable. the played most of the songs off the new album and the last one. i think the oldest song they played was on peak hill(right?). my first fav song by them is the very thing, but i don't think they've ever played it live. :(
they did two encores. the last one, torq convinced (very easily) most of the audience standing to sit down. it was like story time in elementary school all over again. and really awesome. that was a first. as for the flowers from the beginning, during their set towards the end, they threw them out to the audience. no one does that either.
rating: ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ the best stars show yet.