We really never pass up free tickets and despite not being overly familiar with the music of Tegan and Sara, we jumped at the chance to see them live. Earlier in the day, the pair had performed in Tower Records, just off Grafton Street, with a queue to get in the stretched almost two hundred people long. A fairly mixed crowd, predominantly female, we decided not to bother queuing as we had our tickets for the night and were happy enough to be seeing them play later.
Tegan Rain Quin and Sara Kiersten Quin are identical twins born in Canada; they began writing music and playing guitar at the age of fifteen. Only four years later they were signed to a record label and they have been making music, releasing albums and touring the world ever since then. With six albums under their belt, the sisters released their first one in 1999 ‘Under Feet like Ours’ and their latest album, ‘Sainthood’ last year.
Their sound has been described as the stuff angsty, emotional teenage girls listen to in their rooms when they’ve had an argument with their parents – but there is much more to their music than that – categorically, their sound is a mix of New Wave/Indie Pop with a dash of Rock but all of it has some serious soul. With amazing vocals, thoughtful lyrics and excellent rhythm, Tegan and Sara not only write beautiful music but they perform brilliantly, mixing their show up with some of their older songs with newer stuff, funny banter and stories and acoustic sets.
If we had paid for our ticket then we would not have been in anyway disappointed. The Olympia was packed but not uncomfortably so and there was a great energy in the crowd which only strengthened even more when the sisters began to play. Oliver Cole was the support act for Tegan and Sara and he will also support them when they played their Belfast gig. Oliver was a really good performer and suited the concert really well. If you’d like to listen to some of his music then you can do so on his MySpace Page.
Tegan and Sara began around nine and played for over an hour to a captivated crowd. Playing well known songs such as ‘The Con’ ‘Nineteen’ and ‘Where does the good go’, they opened their show with ‘The Ocean’ from their newest album. The crowd burst into applause and cheers that didn’t stop until the band finished playing their last song. Talking to the crowd, Sara talked about how playing in Ireland always feels like she is playing at home and that little bit of Irish she has in her, which was met with more cheers and applause. Later Tegan talked about how they know that a lot of people in the crowd might have downloaded their music ‘for free’ but they didn’t mind because they know that by listening to their music, their fans pass it round, buy t-shirts and come to their shows and she thanked the crowd for their continued support and love.
Playing three of their more well known songs acoustically was a real treat, in particular ‘Dark Come Soon’ was such a fantastic piece. Finishing off with ‘Living Room’ the calmness and relaxed mood from the three acoustic songs was lost again, with the whole band returning to complete the show. Thanking their band, Edward Gowans, Shaun Huberts and Johnny Andrews (who also got his own short but awesome drum solo) the show was over but the excitement and energy in the crowd was still there as everyone was leaving, with people reminiscing about their favourite part of the gig.
Tegan and Sara tend to be tagged as that band who are lesbians that write for lesbians and that is absolutely ridiculous! While the sisters have a huge following in the lesbian community, you can’t pen them down as just some ‘lesbian act’. Their music is engaging, energetic, deep and will either have you thinking about life or have you dancing to some really fantastic tunes. With six albums already, if you haven’t already heard their music then you have plenty of options to choose from. Over the years their music has grown up somewhat but they’ve never lost their sound and while it will vary from album to album, the heart and talent that lingers behind their music is always there.
Their tour continues, with their next stop in Amsterdam but we can’t wait till they return to Ireland again and until then we will be listening to as much Tegan and Sara as possible!
To learn more about Tegan and Sara, you can visit their Official Page.
A special thank you to Tony Ryan for the photographs (ours came out kind of really blurry) and Ciara Nolan for that ticket!
