Live Review & Photos: White Denim and Clear Plastic Masks at the Casbah, February 9, 2014

Photos by Sylvia Borgo
Photos by Sylvia Borgo

After two sold-out nights at L.A.’s Troubador, White Denim played another sold-out show at the Casbah on February 9. The West Coast dates were a part of their North American tour to promote the recently released Corsicana Lemonade, the band’s fifth studio album.

White Denim’s sets are never the same. In fact, their songs are never the same. They come up with the set lists on the fly, never repeating themselves, and each song starts and flows like a good conversation. If the band is having fun, who knows when it’s gonna end.

In San Diego, the night started off a little sketchy, when a fan who was, let’s say “overexcited,” was kicked out of the venue by lead singer/guitarist James Petralli. The incident clearly had an impact on Petralli’s performance, who cranked up his Silvertone amp. His solos were a lot longer than usual. The other guys occasionally looked at him to move on to the next part of the song, but “Wait, I’m not done yet” was his response!

The set included a lot of older songs from Fits, Last Day of Summer, and 2011’s phenomenal D, but it was mainly focused on the new album (why is “Come Back” not playing on the radio every 10 minutes?). Songs like “I Start To Run,” “At The Farm,” “Tony Fatti,” and “Drugs” were some of the crowd’s favorites, but the incredible closer “Street Joy” was the highlight of the night.

Corsicana Lemonade is the first album not produced by the band. They hired Wilco’s Jeff Tweedy to somehow bring the live energy of their shows to the new album — something that some may say is missing from their records. I am not sure they accomplished exactly that, but there’s nothing wrong with being one of the hottest live acts in America right now.

Clear Plastic Masks supported White Denim at the show.

White Denim at the Casbah

Clear Plastic Masks at the Casbah

One thought on “Live Review & Photos: White Denim and Clear Plastic Masks at the Casbah, February 9, 2014”

  1. This may be a little bit too late, but either way, here this is. I’m the fan that got kicked out and this is the Facebook message I wrote to White Denim the day after their show at the Casbah, SD:

    Dear James and the rest of you incredibly talented persons,

    My name is Carlo and I’m a dick. I would like to apologize sincerely about incessantly clapping in my girlfriend’s face, going up on stage last night, interrupting your set, and just frankly being a huge bag of dicks. Ironically enough, you guys are quite literally my favorite band of the last ten years, so getting kicked out for dancing on stage makes me self sabotaging and as asinine as you can get, especially considering that I drove from Los Angeles to see y’all’s. That being said, I’d like to reiterate the purpose of this note. I’m just writing you guys to express my deepest apologies. It’s truly sad because I can’t even remember the first song of your set. I was definitely black, brown, and greyed out and haven’t been that out of control in a while. I don’t really cry about much and when I got back to the hotel, I fucking did. At any rate, hope you guys keep being awesome and maybe I’ll come to a show and just stand in the back. I learned a few valuable life lessons in a short span of time.

    Yours truly,
    Your biggest most annoying fan

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