INDY'S WEEKLY ALTERNATIVE NEWSPAPER HIGHLIGHTING ARTS, ENTERTAINMENT AND SOCIAL JUSTICE

Easter: the hellogoodbye way

hellogoodbye
Emerson Theater
Sunday, April 16

Pinatas? Yes! Hotdog suits? Why not! Lifeboats? Of course! No one was surprised when hellogoodbye guitarist and lead singer Forrest Kline took the stage on Sunday night, held a purple stuffed rabbit to the microphone and announced, “This is pretty much what the whole show is going to be.” Opening with “Call ’n’ Return,” before the third strike of the cowbell the crowd was going wild.

Still touring in support of last year’s self-titled debut EP on Drive Through Records, the set included a mix of older favorites, as well as a few new songs from their forthcoming summer release that, thanks to the Internet, most fans already know the words to. For roughly 45 minutes, Kline and bandmates Jesse Kurvink on keyboards, Marcus Cole on bass and Chris Profeta on drums kept the crowd singing, dancing and laughing.

Ending the show with the climatic and chaotic “Touchdown Turnaround,” the band used all of the aforementioned random objects to assault the crowd. With chants of “One last song!” still going strong, the boys returned for an encore with the crowd favorite “Jesse Buy Nothing, Go to Prom Anyway.”

hellogoodbye put on an energetic and enjoyable show. Anyone who didn’t dance or laugh was either plugging their ears or covering their eyes. Everyone’s geeky hero Kline had his own vision problem when the set ended, however, yelling to the crowd, “Wait! Has anyone seen my glasses?!” as the lights came up.