Thrice - Major / Minor

If Beggars represented the completion of Thrice’s transition into an Alternative rock band, then Major / Minor exists to complete that legacy. An extremely solid album that in my opinion, lacks slightly in lyrical content when compared to it’s predecessor but makes up for it with extremely tight songwriting. Unfortunately I haven’t been able to listen to this as much as I’d like to because I haven’t been able to pick up a copy but thanks to Spotify I’ve been able to hear it before I buy it and it’s definitely on my shopping list for 2012.
This album also marks what could possibly be the end of Thrice as a “full time band” following a statement from Dustin on Thrice.net that the band wasn’t breaking up but taking a break…

Favourite Songs - Yellow Belly, Cataracts & Call It In The Air

I know I’m a bit late with this (and I always seem to be about 4 - 5 months behind when it comes to new music releases ¬_¬) by Major/Minor is a really good album and it’s a shame that Thrice have decided to call a “hiatus” because they just get better and better with every record and I wouldn’t consider M/M a peak by any standards, there is still room for this band to progress to the hypothetical next level, but for now, if we are left with M/M as the “final” record, it’s a pretty good offering. My personal favourite from the record is Cataracts, but Yellow Belly, the opener, and Words In The Water are also pretty good songs.

very rapidly shooting up in my estimation.

they’ve been one of my favourite bands for ages, but they are very close to overtaking mewithoutYou as my favouritest band. :)

I’ve never done anything like this before, so if it sucks, put it down to inexperience :).

First of all, the whole reason I won this in the first place is down to Gigs & Tours, who I follow on twitter, so massive thanks to them for picking me as the winner, and a massive thanks to Polydor records who are very nice people!

Turned up at the arena at about 3.30pm, there was something like 10 or 15 of us in total, i’m not sure? Everyone got a free copy of Daisy which was generous, since I’d already pre-ordered a signed copy from Newbury Comics I gave both of mine to the 2 lads that had very generously driven me all the way to Wembley, about 110 miles, and all the way back after the show. We were led to the main arena by security who told us it was strictly no photos or pictures, which kinda sucked. The band were soundchecking and went through about 4 or 6 songs including Vices, You Stole and At The Bottom. At one point, Jesse was fine tuning his guitar and started playing the opening bar or Nirvana - Rape Me… He also soundchecked with an acoustic guitar and it was even set up and plugged in on stage during the show but he didn’t use it once for some reason?
The whole soundchecking process took about an hour or so, after that the band disappeared for about 10 minutes then came out in to main arena, Brian, Derrick and Gerrett came out first, and looked slightly nervous but friendly enough. Vin seemed to take it all in his stride chatting away to fans about Glastonbury and Reading, finally after about 5 or so minutes Jesse came swanning out, munching on a nectarine and went straight over to the girls! He was a friendly guy though, he asked everybody their name and shook everyone’s hand. None of them seemed to have the slightest little bit of rock star arrogance. They all talked about how they were a bit nervous about the show because they hadn’t played together since October. But in retrospect everything seemed to go smooth. I heard them talking to one guy about UK festivals and they aid they couldnt really say anything right now, so maybe they’ll be making an appearence? Who knows.
To be fair I didn’t really speak to the band too much, I never know what to say! I met Frank Turner a few years ago and couldn’t really say much! So I’m sure some of the girls that were there have much more awesome stories than me.
We only got to spend about 10 or 20 minutes with them, but everyone got their stuff signed, alot of people were getting Daisy signed. They were all really friendly and none of them came off as arrogant or pompous which was pretty cool considering how big a band they are.

I can’t remember the whole set list for the actual gig, but the opening was Welcome To Bangkok with 2 drummers, I’m not sure who the other drummer was but he stayed on stage all night providing various extra percussion. They went through their whole back and uhh… present catalogue including: Sic Transit Gloria, Sowing Season, Vices, Gasoline, Jude Law…, Seventy Times Seven, At The Bottom, The Archers Bows Are Broken, Okay I Believe You… and Sink. I think they only played 3 tracks from Daisy which kinda surprised me really. There was solo electric version of Limo which was amazing and ended with the rest of the band rejoining Jesse for the closing. And the final track was a solo electric version of Play Crack The Sky was a great closing song.

I feel like I should talk about Glassjaw and Thrice a little bit before I close this off. Both bands were equally as amazing. Thrice are easily one of the most under appreciated alternative rock bands out there and the live version of Artist In The Ambulance was outstanding. The closing song was the title track from the new record, Beggars, and was just mind-blowing.
Glassjaw who I was seriously just as excited about seeing as I was Brand New, were outstanding. Daryl Palumbo is an enigma, he just has bundles of energy! They were loud. VERY loud and didn’t fail to disappoint. Siberian Kiss, the closing song was dedicated to Justin Beck. If you haven’t seen them live I seriously recommend it, they were amazing. An awesome gig.