So what is a Phillies fan to do? Watch as your team will probably (and eventually) lose to the Colorado Rockies in the NLDS or go see the biggest NYC concert lineup of ‘07. Well, frequent text messages aside, I ended up going to Randall’s Island for the big show on Saturday. As we said earlier, Les Savy Fav were stellar and Blonde Redhead were seductive and mesmerizing. Quote of the night was from a token Joey Brooklyn-type during Blonde Redhead’s set; “Yo, this beat is hott.”

Dude rockers aside, I must say, one thing that surprised me was the lack of movement during LCD Soundsystem’s set. It seemed like the majority of the crowd, from my angle, were unaware of the addictive disco punk grooves of James Murphy. The lack of interest did somewhat damper their otherwise solid set but that didn’t really seem to phase the band. They breezed through a uproarious set mostly comprised of selections from their brilliant new album Sound Of Silver (DFA), with some older numbers like “Yeah (Crass Version)” thrown in for good measure.

After an hour and change set from LCD, the Arcade Fire were ready to put the cherry on top of this indie rock super fest. Follow after the jump for more thoughts and pictures.

An Arcade Fire show is the complete package with an awesome stage set up, excellent tunes and enough energy to make 25,000 people go completely nuts. The band mix and matched from their two full-lengths but everybody seems to rambling about Win Butler’s announcement that this would be the band’s last NYC show for ”a couple of years.” Even though the band has been in town a bunch since the release of Neon Bible (Merge), it is somewhat surprising since the album was only released last spring. All signs point at the band going back into the studio to work on album number three but for the time being, they were focused on closing out their huge tour with a riveting performance. The band even risked life and limb at times, with Will Butler climbing up the side of the stage at one point. After leaving everyone satisfied with their set-closer “Wake Up,” the band ran to the side of the stage and banged through an acoustic version of the Violet Femmes classic “Kiss Off.”

While I will certainly need a lot of convincing to ever return to Randall’s Island for a concert, Saturday was most definitely a special event. All those incredible bands jam packed into one bill made me forget about baseball for a few hours …or at least until after the show was over.

Photo Credit

Tags: Arcade Fire, Blonde Redhead, LCD Soundsystem, Les Savy Fav, show review //