The Only Time I Saw Frightened Rabbit
Frightened Rabbit
The passing of Frightened Rabbit’s frontman Scott Hutchison is truly heartbreaking, I barely knew the band but I had the chance to see them in July 2013, during one of these Red Bull Sound Select series organized at the defunct House of Blues on the Sunset Strip. These shows are organized to introduce emerging local artists combined with more famous (international) acts, and Frightened Rabbit were headlining the show, after Tapioca and the Flea, Gothic Tropic and HOTT MT. Three years later, they had a show at the Henry Fonda theater in Los Angeles, and I couldn’t go. I realize there will never be another occasion to see Frightened Rabbit now, and it’s extremely sad.
This is what I wrote 5 years ago:
I guess many people had come for the Scottish band Frightened Rabbit, the last act and headliner. I personally didn’t know them, and despite the late hour, they gave a very energetic show filled with harmonies, layered and expansive guitars, dynamic and even furious drumming. How come I knew nothing about these guys? I was surrounded by true fans who were singing all the songs, and my first idea was that they sounded like a more rocking version of the Lumineers. There were obvious elements of folk, some heartfelt handclaps and foot tapping parts, some acoustic-feeling songs, some muscular ones — and I am talking Springsteen-triumphant-muscular — and a loveable frontman, Scott Hutchison, who seemed thrilled to play in the US again. But with that current renaissance of folk bands, they shouldn’t have any problem to play more often here.
There was a sense of urgency running through the songs, as many of them tended to turn almost bombast without totally succumb to the style, and upon hearing the ‘yahoos’ that some of the people around me were shouting, I can tell that the music was producing a real euphoric effect on the crowd. They had a few truly epic songs and really catchy ones like ‘The Woodpile’… while the lyrics were apparently about heartbreaks and damages that life does to you, which made me totally understand why the crowd was so engaged,… not that I could really understand the lyrics as the vocals were competing too much with the piercing ringing guitars and stadium-like sound… But we will hear more of their anthems soon as they have just started a mega US tour.
