Live Review: Leprous @ Racket NYC (2024-09-13)
w/ special guest The World Is A Beautiful Place & I Am No Longer Afraid To Die
Event Details:
Date: September 13, 2024
Venue: Racket NYC (Manhattan)
Ticket Price: $42.98
Artists: Leprous w/ The World Is A Beautiful Place & I Am No Longer Afraid To Die
Although I was excited for tonight's show, the prevailing thought of the day was “I should be seeing Monuments tonight.” One of my favorite bands, probably in my top 10, was supposed to open for Leprous on this tour but some unfortunate health issues sidelined their guitarist and they were forced to drop from the tour. Devastating news when I first heard it but I knew Leprous would still jam and I was eagerly awaiting their new album release, Melodies of Atonement. They eventually announced that The World Is A Beautiful Place & I Am No Longer Afraid To Die (TWIABP so I don't have to type that ridiculous name again) would be replacing Monuments, which seemed like an interesting choice because they are a much different band altogether.
I first saw TWIABP open for The Ocean, but only managed to catch a portion of their set so I wasn’t able to form a strong opinion. We caught most of the set tonight and I would almost say it reminds of a darker, dissonant cross between Sunny Day Real Estate and Pile. They aren’t bad but they also aren’t going to blow you away with anything revolutionary either. There were people in the crowd digging it so they are doing something right.
Headlining tonight was Norwegian progressive metal band, Leprous, and this was my second time seeing them. They were actually the first show I attended after the pandemic “ended” and we were allowed to go to concerts again. An old colleague from Finland originally introduced me to them and I think they are one of his favorite groups.
The venue is also a great little venue called Racket NYC with a capacity of around 650 people. They moved the show from its original location, Webster Hall, likely because ticket sales weren’t great but it probably ended up being a better experience. I would prefer a packed smaller venue than a spread out larger venue.
Around 9:30 PM the band made their way on stage and kicked off the set with the opening track of their new album. The newer album had rumors of getting back to their heavier roots, which it does at times, but overall has a much slower tempo throughout which are constantly building up to these heavy crescendos.
I actually like the new album quite a bit after a few listens and their old stuff is great too. There are a few crowd favorites that everyone seems to ramp up to another level for, one of them being my personal favorite, “Fan the Flame”. It has such a cool pulsing groove driving the verse with an epic triumphant sounding chorus. By this point in the show, the singer’s voice had really warmed up and he was hitting all of those high notes perfectly.
You don’t hear male artists in rock or metal sing in his range often anymore, much more of a late 70s and 80s sort of vibe, but it works well for their style. I would say the drummer probably carries the band alongside the singer, with the guitars and bass threading the needles to tie everything together. They have some electronic elements but I wouldn’t say it heavily defines their sound. They even had some technical difficulties tonight, forcing them to go off script and play some of their older tracks that didn’t have the keyboards and samples.
Seeing the band deal with some of the issues tonight, switch up the setlist mid set and letting a random fan pick the last song was quite impressive. These are professional musicians after all, so you almost expect them to be able to do all of the above without issue, but I feel like many bands couldn’t pull songs randomly from their discography to play at a moments notice.
The band played for an hour and forty five minutes, featuring a nice range of tracks from nearly every album. The crowd was a bit chatty but thankfully bands like this are loud enough to mostly drown out the annoying people that talk during shows. I will never understand why you pay to go to a live show and then talk the entire time. Otherwise, it was a great show and start to the weekend.
Cheers and keep rocking!