Tegan & Sara kicked off their two night stint at New York’s Town Hall tonight and I’ve got your first report on the show.

Town Hall is a great venue for a band like Tegan & Sara.  It’s small, yet can accommodate a good sized crowd.  It’s got seats, but you can still stand and rock out.  I’ve seen Tegan & Sara many times now and I’ve seen them play rooms that were too small (Hiro Ballroom) and too large (Terminal 5), Town Hall seemed just right.  Although we’ll discuss the Hiro Ballroom show in a little bit because it sort of relates to this show.

First let’s start at the beginning.  I got there at about 7:20 and doors were already open, although it was slow getting in.  I was surprised because on their website they said doors usually open 30 minutes before the advertised showtime.  I made it in without any problem and immediately could not move because the lobby was packed.  Town Hall has a very small lobby (it’s a very small place) and the merch table was set up oddly on one side of it creating this massive line that took over the entire entrance way.  I did see a bar so I decided I’d relax with a drink before heading to my seat.  After buying my drink I attempted to go to my seat and was informed that you couldn’t bring drinks to your seat.  This seemed counter-intuitive and retarded.  Anyway I finished the drink while waiting on the merch line.  I couldn’t resist a t-shirt, since I collect concert shirts.  I got a black shirt with the image with the numbers that’s inside the booklet of Sainthood and has the album’s tracklist on the back.  They also had a white shirt that had the striped shirt T&S are wearing on the Sainthood cover, and a red hoodie that I didn’t really look at too well.  Anyway I took my seat finally and not much longer the opening band came out.

Katie Stelmanis was the opener.  I was unimpressed by her.  She had a guitarist and a drummer, who played standing up but was mostly playing the most basic of beats.  My thoughts throughout the set were 1) that I was bored and 2) that the set the drummer had was going to waste.  She did go on exactly at 8 on the dot and did about a 40-something minute set.

At exactly 9, actually I think it may have been 8:58, Tegan & Sara came out.  Constant pros those two.  They immediately launched into “The Con”.  It was pretty amazing.  I’ve seen them play that song a whole bunch of times but it was still wonderful.  Next they dropped a surprise by going straight into “Walking With A Ghost”.  Their biggest hit, they’re still at a stage where they have to play it and usually they rush through it, but later in the show.  Tonight they did it second but it didn’t feel rushed at all.  There was some talking, Sara was especially talkative tonight, and everyone was encouraged to stand up.  They talked about how excited everyone looked.  After another song they told us they’d be playing the entire new album for us tonight.  This led to a rant about how they wouldn’t want to go to a bands show and hear the new stuff cause they like the old stuff, etc.  It was pretty funny.

Anyway they went into a block of Sainthood songs in album order.  Now this is where that Hiro Ballroom show comes in.  When The Con first came out, actually I’m not even sure if it was officially out or just about to come out and leaked, Tegan & Sara did a similar thing to this small run of shows where they did intimate venues and played the entire album.  That time the room was much smaller, so small you could hear whispering in the crowd, and they did The Con in reverse order for some reason.  This reminded me of that very much, only a bigger room.

All the new stuff held up very well live.  It’s actually my one complaint about a Tegan & Sara show is that they usually play things exactly as they are on the album.  Rarely do they change something up in the live show.  However that complaint is made null by the banter between the two sisters that’s like a great comedy act.  There’s actually a website somewhere that transcribes it all.  I wish I could find that site again.  If you know what it is leave it in the comments.

Tonight the banter was awesome.  Tegan admitted to the crowd and the rest of the band including Sara that for the past month and a half she’s forgotten the second word in the final verse of Northshore.  She says she usually just mumbles it or says nothing and because the lyrics are so fast no one notices.  And that it would be so easy for her to find out what the lyric is because she wrote it but she’s playing a game with herself.

At another point in the show Sara was talking about New York and dry cleaning and somehow the word jizz popped up.  She seemed just as surprised as anyone else and had no idea why that had come out of her mouth.  Tegan said no one knows what that means cause it’s an 80′s word anyway, trying to bring things to a less R-rated level.  Also at one point Sara decided to talk about how the world was going to end in 20 years and how she’d not be a very good survivor and when it does end she won’t last very long.  Tegan told her to shut up with her Armageddon stories and that she was bringing everyone down.

All of this is so much better in person.  It’s like getting a free comedy show with your music.  Also they do it with their adorable Canadian accents.  Pretty much this show hit all the hits and all the new songs in what wound up being a 2 hour set.  When they start a real tour, which they’re doing very soon, they’ll probably work some of the older stuff in to the set.

Speaking of here’s the setlist:

The Con
Walking With a Ghost
I Bet It Stung
Arrow
Don’t Rush
Hell
On Directing
Red Belt
The Cure
Northshore
Night Watch
Soil, Soil
Knife Going In
Like O, Like H
Nineteen
Where Does the Good Go
Speak Slow
Alligator
Paperback Head
The Ocean
Sentimental Tune
Someday
Back in Your Head
Living Room
Call It Off

Oh and how about some audio?

Call It Off

Living Room

The Cure

Knife Going In

Sorry if the quality isn’t the best in the world.  I didn’t use any professional recording devices.  Think of these as samples.

And finally there’s the image gallery.  I wish I could have gotten better pictures, I was going to bring a camera but their website had very ominous messages about cameras.  Turns out like everyone but me had a camera.  So these are from the good ole iPhone.

So that’s all.  I hope you guys enjoyed the write up.  I sure loved the show.  Be sure to catch Tegan & Sara when they come to your town.