Travis Good, lead singer of the Sadies, thanked Kurt Vile at the beginning of the show for inviting them on his tour, but it should have been the other way around: despite the increasing hoopla surrounding Vile, his set was a big, thumping letdown. I expected this because his latest album really sucks, but the Sadies’ more than made up for the violation. We left four songs into Vile’s performance and I didn’t feel bad at all. It was good to see him live, but he’s just not much of an entertainer. He’ll need to come up more stuff like Believe I’m Goin Down, Lott’s Sea Lice, and Walking on a Pretty Daze before I risk seeing him perform live again. The Sadies, though. Mixing in some cool new songs with a blend of their classics, this band fucking rules. During one of their new songs, the band slowly began drawing together toward the drum kit and created such a vortex of sound that I felt like I was witnessing the creation of the song right before my eyes. It was like walking into a garage and watching a band discover a groove and then crank the amps and jam it into life. I don’t know how they managed to pull off “Good Years” – a song about a widow who spreads her asshole husband’s ashes by the sea because she “couldn’t think of any place he’d like to be” – in the middle of all this high energy, dual guitar sonic ripping of a show, but they did. Their song sets are crafted to lift you up, draw you in, then blast you back out. You don’t even mind when Travis turns his back to the crowd during a solo. It’s tough to see them breaking down their stage at the end of the show after cranking so much energy, but it also served as a stark contrast to all the hipster, scarf-wearing roadies who meticulously prepared Vile’s stage. The show ain’t about the lights and the hype. And you can’t create energy by over-mic’ing the bass drum.

However, hanging out for a few minutes with Sean Dean, the Sadies stand-up bassist, as we were on our way out, put a nice big exclamation mark on the night. He was a little drunk, but he chatted and goofed with us, and we invited him to come back to the Beachland Ballroom in Cleveland. Cool dude, cool band.