Jena Berlin / Young Livers - 3.22.08

Washington College, Chestertown, MD
8PM

Our trip to Marlyand started in Philadelphia around 2, and involved many pit stops before we actually made it to the show. The first, and probably most entertaining was a trip to Christiana Mall to grab a computer at the Apple store. There was also a good deal of shenanigans, as well as a meeting with Miss Delaware, who should have her crown revoked for poor grammar during autograph signings, as well as mis-use of the word "chong." Pretty poor pageant winner if you ask me.














After leaving the mall, Heather, Mike, Kev and Rhiannon and I all piled into Rhiannon's car and headed to our second destination - Capriottis. For those not in the know, this sandwich shop has outrageously great turkey sandwiches (both of real meat or vegan - sweet!) that are huge. We all grabbed something to eat and relaxed before the boring stretch of road into Washington College.















Washington College sits in a pretty bare stretch of nothing in Maryland, but let me say that Chestertown has a few things going for it. One, the porches there are unfuckwithable. Seriously, the best. There are also lax as hell liquor stores and pizza places with top notch mozz sticks. All in all, awesome!

We get to the show and hang around for a while, while various members of our entourage and Jena Berlin down whiskey and beers. A college that sells beer on campus! Wild. Eventually, Young Livers get started. I've written a bit about them on here before, and I really like their debut EP. I'm actually in the process of waiting for No Idea to mail it to me. So far, no luck. Hopefully it comes soon! They started with the first two songs from that record, "The Small Hours" and "Non Monumental," and played a good chunk of The New Drop Era. They also played a new song that was great, if not a bit more relaxed seeming. The energy was high, and they sounded tight and pretty huge. A little heckling went down, with my personal favorite being Kev's "You guys are from Florida? Where are your beards at?" They played a pretty short set, only about 6 or 7 songs, but they were really impressive, and nice guys on top of it.















Jena Berlin started next, and were the only other band of the night. As I said above, I love these dudes, and this set was no exception (even if it was a bit long for me). They started with a new song ("this is a song that Small Brown Bike probably would have written") and played a few more new ones than they did a few days earlier at the M Room. They also played a good deal of songs from Quo Vadimus and more from Passion Waits... than I've heard in a while. Most of my favorites were played, and I was glad they ended with "Truth About Liars," since I was bummed when they didn't play it on Tuesday. Jon was as energetic as usual, and they handled the good natured, but relentless heckling fairly well. There were a few too many "we don't have a setlist" breaks, but still a solid sets from one of my favorite locals.