The moody indie pop of Porches filled up the El Rey Theatre in Los Angeles last Tuesday to a sold out crowd.
The mastermind behind the project, Aaron Maine, has been releasing EPs and LPs since 2011, but you wouldn’t know it by the makeup of most of the crowd. His 2021 All Day Gentle Hold brought in a whole new generation of Porches fans. The deep, emotional cadence he has in his voice is turned up to 11 on this album. Dripping in reverb, Maine spills his soul over 11 tracks that have made their way to long time listeners ears and Tik-Tok alike.
On Tuesday, his set was heavy with tracks from this recent effort, along with some hits from Pool, Ricky Music, and The House.
He opened with “Okay”, an immediate earworm with one of the stickiest melodies you’ll hear all year. Constant throughout was his relatively sparse band set up and deeply saturated red lighting. If you weren’t feeling his mood with the music, you certainly were with the lighting.
From there, Maine focused mainly on tracks on All Day Gentle Hold before opening the set to previous albums. “Lately”, the opening track from Gentle Hold, was a certain highlight. The first couple of rows seemed to know every word, and annunciated them with pain and drama as if they penned the song themselves.
Another highlight was certainly his Pool late-album standout “Car”. It’s a terrific pop song in and of itself, but the outro hit especially hard in this particular setting on this particular night.
Porches’ tour continues with dates around the US and eventually moves over to Europe in May. You can see a full list of dates below:
04-08 Dallas, TX – House of Blues (Cambridge Room)
04-09 Austin, TX – Scoot Inn
04-10 Houston, TX – House of Blues (Bronze Peacock Room)
04-12 Atlanta, GA – Terminal West
04-13 Nashville, TN – Exit/In
04-15 Carrboro, NC – Cat’s Cradle
04-16 Washington, D.C. – Union Stage
04-18 New York, NY – Bowery Ballroom
04-19 Brooklyn, NY – Music Hall of Williamsburg
04-21 Boston, MA – Paradise Rock Club
04-22 Philadelphia, PA – The First Unitarian Church
05-13 London, England – Lafayette
05-16 Paris, France – La Maroquinerie
05-17 Amsterdam, Netherlands – Bitterzoet
05-18 Cologne, Germany – Artheater
05-19 Berlin, Germany – Privatclub
Photos and Review by Andrew Ameter | Exclusively for Music, Why Not!
