Liftoff, Joe's Apartment (919 Granville St., Vancouver) July 9.
With Summer Live's free gigs at Stanley Park and the Back Street Boys/New Kids on the Block tour stop at Rogers Arena, entertainment options were spread pretty thin on Saturday night however the newest kids on the block, Liftoff, still managed to draw a rowdy crowd to Joe's Apartment.
The five-piece band has only played four shows this summer with their current line up but you wouldn't be able to tell that from the polished set of all-original material they played at Joe's.
The band (featuring stomping Carmon Leeson on lead vocals, North Vancouver's Gord Gemmell on guitars and vocals, Sean Brennan on Guitars, Shane Recsky on drums and Marc Boily on bass and vocals) have been honing their sound in the studio for some time and have hit Vancouver's club scene ready to rock.
Leeson is the perfect frontman for Liftoff. He usually can be found at the lip of the stage working the audience to show some emotion. His in-your-face approach is textbook rocknroll practised by the likes of Robert Plant and Steven Tyler back in the day. The point is to get a reaction from the audience and Leeson is a natural for that job.
Gemmell supplies killer guitar licks with many of their songs starting off with his riffs leading the band into the songs. Brit-rock influences the overall sound but everything has been filtered through their own sensibilities into something new. They are building their songs for much bigger venues so it was a lot of fun to hear them early on in a small club space.
Most of the tunes performed on Saturday night were recorded in HD video and posted to YouTube with in 24 hours. Liftoff have already put together a strong set of tunes for an album and they went through most of them live. Songs such as "Can't Get You Out of My Mind," "Masquerade" and their first single "The Best" sound like they are ready to be documented in the studio. A video of "The Best" periodically played on screens set up around Joe's with the band saving their live version of the song until near the end of the set.
Already a good band, Liftoff have infinite potential.
For more information on the band go to www.reverbnation.com/liftoffnet or check out YouTube for their latest videos.
