Shards and Social Circkle

Man, what a show! I wasn’t too excited about the prospect of a late-night bar show on a Tuesday, but these bands were both so great that they made it work. This was Shards’ second show… they’re a new band featuring former/current members of Crossed Eyes, Logic Problem, Street Sharks, Media Circus and a bunch of other great local bands that no one outside of Raleigh has ever heard of, but I have a feeling that people will hear about Shards. The music is very dark and mid-paced, very much like TSOL’s early stuff, but the snarling vocals are mean as fuck. I like Will’s Iggy-esque stage presence, too… man, it almost pisses me off how great these guys were at just their second show, but at least I’ll hopefully get to see them a whole lot.

Boston’s Social Circkle headlined this two-band bill, and man did they KILL it. This band’s records were growers for me… I was kind of “eh” about them when they came out, but I find myself coming back to them and noticing subtle little things that I like about them each successive time that I listen. I wondered how similar they would be live, though, because they’ve undergone some pretty significant lineup changes since they last recorded. Indeed, they sounded way different than they did on either of their two EPs, but I loved it! They were just a total bulldozer, playing every song way faster and more powerfully than on the records and stringing every single song together without stopping between. They finished with a hyper-speed version of “Static Eyes” that really ended things with a bang. Wow… I love getting blown away by bands and Social Circkle definitely did the job tonight.