The last time I visited Ottawa’s Canadian Tire Centre, it was filled with hollering hockey fans, an announcer’s voice booming through the speakers and the smell of overpriced beer saturating the air.
But Friday night, the sights and sounds were quite different. That’s because Arcade Fire—arguably one of the greatest live acts around right now—had come to town.
Montreal’s indie darlings managed to transform the massive arena into an intimate feeling discothèque of sorts. Strings of light bulbs hung from the ceiling and a disco ball dangled overhead as fans bopped around and engaged in dance-offs to the sets by opening acts Canadian DJ Kid Koala and electric musician Dan Deacon.
Not that the crowd needed any warming up. Just one look and you could tell they knew what they were in for, with most concert goers—per the band’s request—dressing up for the occasion.
Arcade Fire caught a lot of flack for requesting that fans wear “formal attire or costume” to their Reflektor tour shows. But being there, you could see what they were going for. The throngs of dressed up fans—everything from robots, pieces of bacon and dinosaurs to ladies in prom gowns, men in tuxedos and plenty of sequins—only added to the atmosphere. It was different. It was a spectacle. It was fun. It was just like Arcade Fire.
After the opening acts, the lights went down as someone dressed in the Reflektor suit from the song’s video made their way to the smaller of two stages in the arena. He was joined by “The Reflektors,” Arcade Fire’s alter egos of sorts that don giant papier mâché masks, before the curtain went up on the main stage and the band ripped into the title track from its most recent release. “Update your Facebook status to otherwise occupied,” said frontman Win Butler to the crowd, before taking a fan’s phone to snap some photos as he then led the band into “Flashbulb Eyes.”
The stage matched the dress code and was a sight in and of itself; stark white adorned with reflective accents and flickering lights with enough room for the sextet—Win Butler, his wife Régine Chassange, his brother William, Tim Kingsbury and Ottawa’s own Jeremy Gara and Richard Reed Parry as well as half a dozen others in the supporting ensemble—to move to every delicious note.
While the 20-song set was, as expected, heavy with tunes from Reflektor, they didn’t shy away from a number of fan favorites including “The Suburbs,” “No Cars Go,” “Rebellion (Lies)” and others.
Before the night’s encore, “The Reflektors” once again appeared at the small stage, going into a cover of Ottawa native Alanis Morrissette’s “You Oughta Know.” Not letting them steal the show, Butler and company reappeared on the main stage to take the reins and head into “Normal Person,” followed by an energetic, sprawling rendition of “Here Comes the Nighttime,” which culminated with an epic confetti explosion. Covered in the remnants, fans sang along as Arcade Fire closed its show out with “Wake Up,” the single from the band’s debut album Funeral.
In their song, “Normal Person,” Arcade Fire asks, “I’m so confused, am I a normal person?” It’s a question that anyone who catches this tour, with its kinetic energy, musical prowess and grandiose theatrics will be able to answer—Arcade Fire is anything but normal. Here’s hoping they stay that way.
-Sarah Compo (@sarahcompo)
Arcade Fire setlist, 3/14/14, Canadian Tire Centre:
Reflektor
Flashbulb Eyes
Neighbourhood #3 (Power Out)
Rebellion (Lies)
We Used to Wait
The Suburbs
Ready to Start
Neighbourhoods #1 (Tunnels)
We Exist
Intervention
No Cars Go
Haiti
Afterlife
It’s Never Over (Hey Orpheus)
Sprawl II (Mountains Beyond Mountains)
Supersymmetry
Encore:
Normal Person
Here Comes the Night Time
Wake Up