This past Thursday a couple of people from work, with a few friends and girlfriends, went to see The Shins at Koko in Camden.

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Most say that before this week, I hadn’t really listen to The Shins all that much. But the three days before the gig night, I gave ‘Oh Inverted World’ and ‘Chutes Too Narrow’ a good couple of spins. I really liked what I heard (and was kind of disappointed at myself, not realising this earlier - that The Shins is really good). So along with my newly born hunger for The Shins, along with a lot of people saying; ‘They are soooo goood live’, ‘Damn, I didn’t know they were playing! Want ticket!’ etc and so on, my expectations were high…

… but sadly - they didn’t get fulfilled.

They were good. The venue is very nice. The audience were brilliant… but it wasn’t enough. I would have liked a bit more energy on the stage. I didn’t mind that the singer stood nailed to the floor on the far right side of the stage, not saying a word to the audience except a ‘thank you’ after the encore (that was just a bit unusual). But then the drummer didn’t really have any drive. Quite often it felt like he lagged and got behind. The font figure (the keyboard player, who also played guitar and bass) and the guitarist (who also played bass) seemed to enjoy themselves from time to time… But It just wasn’t enough. Not to get me pleased.

Since I hadn’t listen to them all that much either, some songs also sounded like another song they just played 15 minutes ago…

… so, I think a bit my fault as well.

Maybe they are the kind of band that will be totally amazing once you can sing along to every song.
The only way I can find out is to keep listening to the albums and prepare myself for the next time they come to town. And hopefully then they will prove me all wrong.