Review: Brighter, Brightest/Lambs Become Lions Live in St. Catharines

It's your first "non-movie review" special. This past Tuesday I had the great fortune of going to check out a bunch of great bands as they played in The Mansion House parking lot in Downtown St. Catharines. The show was headlined by Toronto based pop-rock band "Brighter, Brightest" and had a who's who of local Niagara bands opening up for them. The outdoor stage was truly amazing, if you've ever been to Mansion House you know that the inside is nothing special so I legitimately believed it'd simply be a band playing under a tent and everyone else just standing around in the parking lot however they had it all blocked off nicely with a bar out back and a big tent over the concert goers heads as well. It was a perfect brisk fall night as everyone was rocking a hoodie and having a good time.

The first band was Brave The Wild, a band whose members are from all over Southern Ontario though their facebook page states they are a Toronto band, which is where I seen them play their first show opening up for Hit The Lights. They play a blend of punk rock and pop-punk that was quite enjoyable.

Next up was Niagara Falls based "I've Got Gloria" featuring Matt Dell, who was a solo artist for about 6 years before joining Gloria as their lead vocals, this group plays a little harder but Dell's vocals are so soft and almost pop-like that the 2 play very well off of each other.

The 3rd band of the evening was Bitter Kids from St. Catharines, they've been making a name for themselves since officially forming in spring and have been trending upwards as the band consists of various members of now defunct Niagara bands so there was already built in expectations before this band hit the stage, their blend of post-hardcore and melodic punk makes it an interesting pair that does work and it'll be exciting to see what Bitter Kids has in store for us in the future as they have just finished recording their debut EP.

If you can only pick 3 Niagara bands right now making a huge impact on the scene as we know it. Lambs Become Lions has to be one of them. It's not quite pop, it's not quite country either, it's not exactly rock and it's certainly not punk but does draw influences from it especially if you ever seen their Fall Out Boy covers. What you get is a great mix as Lambs draws from various inspirational molds to write and perform songs they want to. It just so happens that people like their music just as much as they do. To date Lambs have released 2 EP's 2011's "Cicada" and the latest from November 2012 "Clear Eyes, Full Hearts, Can't Lose" and they played a mixture of fan favourites from both leading up to Lake Ontario... The song that best describes Lambs as a band.

Then came the headliner, Brighter, Brightest have been around since 2008 but the band really garnered attention in the summer of 2010 when they were featured on MuchMusic's Discovered. On the show we watched the band record their debut full length Right For Me. With the video for the lead single Everyday in heavy rotation, Brighter, Brightest became a household name, a video for Right For Me followed that but we haven't heard anything from them since then, except for a small role on Family Channel's The Next Step this past year. But 2013 promises to bring new music from Brighter, Brightest and it's clear to me that this EP they promise to have out before the new year will be some of the best music they ever wrote as they played old favourites All I know, Kiss and the aforementioned Everyday and Right For Me, the latter which they closed with. They also played 4 brand new songs including the extremely catchy Someone New and the beautifully crafted Strike Gold which talks about the music industry today.

While the first 3 bands of this show are still growing and we have yet to see what the future has in store from them, the 2 latter bands are playing at the top of their game right now! So if you have an opportunity to check out any of these bands I highly recommend you do.