I’m definitely late to this, as perhaps were many during the Vans Warped Tour, but Concrete Vehicles used to be called Computer. They’re still the same noisy post-punk seven-piece from Vancouver, with their blistering debut, Station On The Hill, coming out almost a year ago on Dine Alone Records. They take their new name from the vicious second track of the same title on that album.
I expected this show to be packed. Concrete Vehicles (fka Computer) got some really good international press and was everywhere last year, going on tour with the new Vancouver Sub Pop-signed post-hardcore warriors, Piss.
But Concrete Vehicles played at around 1 pm during Vans Warped Tour to an almost empty parking lot. OK, there were probably 100 people in total scattered at their chaotic show. But with the band’s harnessed, frenetic energy, it didn’t matter. They played loud, fast and hard, as if they were in a room of thousands. The saxophone was almost indiscernible, but man, he was fun to watch, and the synth player would rip his keyboard off the stand, cords dangling asunder, and run around the stage.
Vocalist and rhythm guitarist, Ben Lock, wielded a guitar that was consistently buzzing, with the strings hanging off the headstock, as he thrashed about like an ape. At one point, he began throwing the mic stand in the air and catching it. I half expected the rest of the band to start destroying their amps or instruments during “Weird New Vocation.” Pure stage violence. Once they come back and play a well-attended show, you can be sure I’ll be in the mosh.
