Milky Chance @ The Fillmore
WRITTEN & PHOTOS BY: Rita Thompson
As Monday rolled around meaning nothing more than another week of class and stress for most, January 22nd meant something much more for Milky Chance fans. As the crowd rushed into The Fillmore, it was pretty clear that I wasn’t the only one drawn out of my Monday blues by the musical stylings of the German folk group. While waiting for the performance to start, you could literally feel the energy in the crowd as everyone anticipated the raspy, yet crisp vocals of Clemens Rehbein and dancey beats produced by bandmate, Philipp Dausch on the bongos.
Although not very familiar with the opener Lewis Capaldi, he certainly did an amazing job getting the crowd excited for not only the main act to come, but about himself and his own career. He put on an extremely emotional performance, giving me goosebumps during his Hozier-esque performance of one of his most popular songs, “Bruises.” The Scottish singer-songwriter without a doubt added me to his fan base!
Milky Chance took the stage at 9 pm on the dot, starting the night off with “Cloud,” the 5th track and one of the more upbeat songs on the album, which proved to get the crowd excited and rocking out. The group continued the night with many more songs off Blossom, but still pleased original fans by sprinkling in tracks from their 2013 debut album, Sadnecessary, such as hits like “Flashed Junk Mind,” and bonus track, “Loveland.” Not one song went un-sung by the audience.
Frontman Rehbein seemed to barely take as much as a quick breath between songs, making sure the crowd got as much music as possible. Only stopping for a short moment to acknowledge the Eagles making it to Superbowl, eliciting a booming “E-A-G-L-E-S EAGLES!” chant from the crowd. With a close to two hours set disrupted by nothing, I was pretty impressed by the group’s stamina and longing to give their fans what they paid for, great music!
The performance would not have been the same without the backup guitarist, Antonio Greger, band member since 2015. The on-stage relationship, full of banter and guitar duels between Greger and Rehbein was undeniably authentic, not to mention wildly entertaining. Not only did Greger kill it on the strings, but his insane, seemingly never ending harmonica solos impressed the crowd as well. The group also added a fourth edition for the sake of the Blossom Tour, Sebastian Schmidt, who made sure his presence was known on the drums. The fans loved the seemingly “conversations” back and forth between Philipp Dausch on the bongos and Schmidt on the kit.
The show finished out with an encore featuring their biggest hit “Stolen Dance” and a rendition of their song “Sweet Sun,” including close to 10 minutes of guitar and harmonica riffs, and the groovy dance moves of Philipp Dausch, whose presence I wish wasn’t restricted by his kit during most of the set. Overall, the band’s encore was definitely something to remember. Even without crazy staging productions that some musicians have, Milky Chance kept the crowd hyped through their talent and energy.
As the back of Rehbein’s t-shirt said “either you rock or you suck,” and they definitely rocked. For those who only know hits like “Stolen Dance,” I strongly urge you to dig a little deeper into the chilling and unique sound that is Milky Chance. Oh, and definitely check out those acoustic tracks at the end of the album!
Setlist:
- Clouds
Ego- Blossom
- Doing Good
- Firebird
- Flashed Junk Mind
- Peripeteia
- Cold Blue Rain
- Down By the River
- Sadnecessary
- Alive
- Bad Things
- Fairytale
- Loveland
- Cocoon
Encore
- Stolen Dance
- Sweet Sun
