It’s clear from the moment they hit the stage that Pattern Is Movement want to become everybody’s friends. The Philadelphia duo immediately invite everyone down to the stage, eliminating the awkward horseshoe shaped barrier that sometimes exists between band and audience and immediately plunge into their visceral yet symphonic tunes from last month’s release, All Together, that include such disparate influences as Radiohead, math rockers like Deerhoof and Broadway musicals. Then they ask the audience to join in for hand clapping and sing-alongs, whether they know the words to the songs or not. Andrew Thiboldeaux’s vibrant tenor and friendly manner of speaking and the cheerful exuberance of drummer Chris Ward make the show an inviting experience. Thiboldeaux will even take his shoes off. We caught up with both Thiboldeaux and Ward after their Baltimore show to ask them five (actually, six) questions about covering Radiohead, which city has given them the best sing-a-long and what they had planned for last night’s show at the Black Cat Backstage with another duo, Phoenix Subpoppers, Helio Sequence.

Since your last album you’ve changed from a quartet to a duo. How has that changed the way your live show has been set up?

CW: More gear and less people. So, our backs are hurting.

AT: Yeah it’s hard to move all the stuff but it’s funny because I think that there’s more responsibility onstage than there was before because we all could share the responsibilities of sound and parts and everything. But we had to really be on our game all the set, doing a good job the whole time.

CW: It creates a really interesting dynamic because you have just two people on the stage moving at such a pace that creates like a whirlwind of sound. With four people it wasn’t as much of a whirlwind. It was almost more subdued. With two people we can’t be as subdued. It just can’t be because you have just two people to play all this music. So, I think that the two piece actually works out and a lot of bands like Wye Oak are doing it. It creates a dynamic that’s very unique and seems to translate really well at small clubs. I mean Mates of State pulls it off in front of thousands of people. Not that I’m comparing ourselves to that but I mean the two piece idea, really translates well into crowds so I mean, we’ve been really happy. We were scared out of our minds when we did it the first time. I felt like I’d never played music before in my life. My knees were knocking.