Heart - It Races! Architecture in Helsinki -Opera House Oct 18, 2007

Opening with a lil extenda-added-female-vocal Heavy February as an intro they then drummed their way along through a few tracks off the new album. Red Turned White was in the first part of the show, as was Nothing's Wrong. The thing is that something was wrong. They weren't blowing people away and weren't getting the response they deserved even what they were doing. The lead-male even commented on the amount of chatter that was going after a couple songs. The only cure was to step things up. And as things moved along they did. Old favourites such as It'5! and The Cemetery helped immensely as the response was visibly more enthusiastic. After that tracks such as Like It Ar Not (a personal fave) and Debbie (my roommate Taylor's fave from the new album) were greeted by the crowd with more vigor. From here it got a lil personal touch, with Frenchie I'm Faking starting off with a couple minutes of fairly faithful rendition before changing into an unrecognizable conclusion. A cover - something about dancing til the beat's back in the box was much like the show, started slow but by the end had the fairly coarse Toronto crowd moving on their feet. During a bit of banter they expressed how they felt as if they were on hallowed ground since they were so near to Degrassi High and proceeded to shout out songs all different characters from the show. A little Lazy (Lazy) from the new album took away a bit of dancing but was fine. Feather in a Baseball Cap and Hold Music were also tossed in along with the number one hit from the Crocodile Dundee soundtrack circa 1985 which also picked up steam to something very fun in the end. Do the Whirlwind was fine but my standout track for the night was Wishbone as they broke out the wailing guitars at the end as if it were a real epic tune. It was mockingly funny and enjoyable at the same time.
All the while the sextet ran the gambit on instruments, and swapped out from drumming to lead vocals to guitar (acoustic and electric), cowbell, synths and keys. The female lead danced (and sang) her heart out too. Finally when they left the stage the crowd was ready to give them the ovation they had worked up to.
A protracted Nevereverdid opened the encore, and was followed by an excessively long argument with a few crowd members who adamantly called for a song that they claimed to have not played for four years. After seeming to agree to play Cocomo they charged ahead with the decent though predictable Heart it Races! Waving goodbye the cheers rang down and an enjoyable show that took a while to get off the ground concluded.