Blogpost: Explosions in the Sky @ Jannus Live

Explosions in the Sky

Jannus Live

St. Petersburg, FL

April 12th, 2017

Explosions in the Sky are a rarity in the day and age of the “right now”, with information at everyone’s finger tips, all the time There seems to be a slight movement away from music that might take a minute to make an impact and breathe life into anticipation. Sometimes anticipation is the thing that makes it exciting….

Explosions in the Sky are masters of this. The Austin, TX band have been doing it for nearly 20 years with mini-symphonies that sit the listener on the edge…. With heaping doses of anticipation. It’s no different in a live setting. The band stopped by the shores of the Gulf on the stage of Jannus Live in the heart of the St Petersburg downtown area on April 12th. The band walked out to at least 500 screaming fans, more than I think they had expected, and played until the curfew made them stop.

For a band with no lead singer, they captivated the attention of the entire crowd moving through their instrumentals as if we were watching a movie, captivating the audience with very little downtime, the music bleeding through as the band switched instruments, turned on pedals, and moved around the stage in a blanket of multi--colored smoke.

They played songs from most of their seven studio records and various soundtracks and compilations, but I believe that didn’t matter, they could have been playing the Brady Bunch theme song and the crowd would have ate it up. Guitarists Mark Smith, Munaf Rayani, and Michael James, stalked in unison on stage, simultaneously telling their story, and summoning demons. The band totally and completely immersed themselves in the audience, I have yet to go to a show where this has happened ad length. It might be for a song or two, but this was the entire set, let alone without a front man to focus on. The absence of that front man allowed the band, and the audience, to connect on a much deeper level. With no narration, the band made the music more personal, telling a different story to each listener.

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Photo by Brian Furman