[phlipcam video] Vampire Weekend and Beach House @ the Pavilion

Vampire Weekend--Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa

The weather was fittingly inclement for the last show of the summer at the Bank of America Pavilion last night. In fact it was damn freezing. Not that it deterred any of the very amped up Vampire Weekend fans who turned out in droves to see the clean-cut indie kids play the last gig on the last leg of their summer tour. This scene was a total dork-fest...and I mean that in the best way possible. What else could you expect from a band of dudes who sing about madras and the pains of having it bad for an uptight Romantics major?

It was an unabashed Oxford shirt-clad circle-jerk; everyone hopping around happily (and mostly awkwardly) as Ezra Koenig crooned them into a frenzy. The band (whose live sound, incidentally, is almost identical to that of their studio albums) kept up a running banter with the audience in between tracks pulled mostly from their self-titled freshman album. Two middle-aged guys in high school varsity jackets in front of me knew every word to every song, singing along in unison like a couple of giddy school girls. A kid next to me almost lost his wire-framed specs, he was jitter-bugging around so frantically. Total dork-fest! And yet, it turned out to be one of the coolest shows I've seen at the Pavilion this summer. Go figure.

 Beach House--10 Mile Stereo

Not half as nerdy were Baltimore dream-poppers, Beach House. Back-lit by a tapestry of twinkling stars (in juxtaposition to Vampire Weekend, who played beneath six sparkling chandeliers that rose and descended throughout the show) the duo had the crowd fairly transfixed for the entirety of their roughly hour-and-change set. In fact, it seemed like the much buzzed-about twosome seemed to share the headlining spot as much as they opened for it.More than a few people in my section took off after Beach House's stars went dim...and didn't come back.