White Rabbits new song (21.2 MB) High Noon Saloon Madison, WI January 19, 2008

The first of Madison's high-power club bills happened on a freezing night a week back, featuring a big name indie rock act (The Walkmen) and two openers who could have easily carried their own shows. Our interest was the middle band of the night, White Rabbits, who blew us away last summer and recently landed at #1 on my list of top 2007 albums.

We got to the High Noon about 15 minutes after the posted show time, and the line had already begun stretching down the parking lot. This only seems to happen at winter sell-outs -- a couple years ago, Andrew Bird actually apologized to everybody for having to stand out in the below-zero temperatures. Surprisingly, the show started close to on time, and by the time the will-calls had cleared through the line we only got to hear the last couple songs from SXSW favorites White Denim, who were pretty good. I bought their 7", but haven't gotten around to getting my turntable hooked back up right to listen to it.

Unlike a lot of High Noon sell-outs, everybody seemed to get there early for this show and the place was basically full before White Rabbits came on. They opened their set with this new song -- one of a few they played -- and it sounds like they have a good base for their next album. The only problem is that we wound up so close to the stage as people filed in behind us that my audio started to get a bit blown out. I think this was the closest I'd been to the stage since I started using this camera and my little bootleg mics, except maybe the Jail show I shot at Mad Planet last year, which was also blown out. It's the only limitation I've found with them, but worth dealing with if only to get out of the big front-of-crowd press.