At the end of 2007, one of the blogosphere’s more ubiquitous concertgoers named Grizzly Bear his number one show of the year. Initially, this announcement prompted me to kick myself for using that particular set as a bathroom/lunch break at that year’s Pitchfork Festival. However, as time passed, I started to question his judgment. Grizzly Bear’s breakout 2006 release, Yellow House‘s combination of stunning harmonies and instrumentation and tedious meandering makes it a difficult album to complete in one listening, and this year’s highly lauded Veckatimest seems like it would make the perfect soundtrack to the poppies scene in The Wizard of Oz. There’s a sense of enchantment, ethereal choral harmonies and a sinister undertone, but it’s also highly conducive to putting the listener to sleep. As such, I kept waiting for the moment during Grizzly Bear’s set where the show would lose my interest.

It never happened. Because while Grizzly Bear albums can be a little top-heavy with filler suitable only as background noise, there are enough songs within those albums that are flawlessly constructed and their choice of songs and staging highlighted the band’s considerable strengths. All four members of the band stood in a horizontal line in the front of the stage, allowing no nuance to be lost. Everything from the frenetic instrument switching of Chris Taylor (who played bass, flute and clarinet) to the choral nature of their four part harmonies was highlighted by their setup. And what harmonies they were. We’ve covered bands where all four members can sing, but not with the bell-like clarity of the gentlemen in Grizzly Bear.