TUESDAY 03/22/16 – NEW YORK, NEW YORK
“You’ve seen Woodie Allen in Annie Hall, this is Hoodie Allen at Webster Hall.” I’m sure somebody thought of that, but I said it. I have no shame. This was my first live exposure to Hoodie Allen. I’m anti-social so I had to psyche myself up to fully enjoy my experience at the famous Webster Hall. I got to East Village early around 5:30 and saw a long line of fanatical fanatics with an agenda. I got there in time to see him roll up to the venue and he seemed ready for what would be the last day of his Happy Camper tour. Hoodie Allen’s a man who is Long Island born and bred so it must be a good feeling to end his tour on a high note by coming home to a sold out show filled with screaming supporters. Hoodie is just coming off his new album Happy Camper from January.
Show started off with some electricity. The lineup for the show was Bryce Vine, gnash, SuperDuperKyle, Blackbear and the main man Hoodie Allen. However, Blackbear was absent as he had been the last few dates, an unfortunate note but fortunately the other acts pulled their weight. Bryce, another New York artist, was first and got the people moving with flashy lights and samplings on what would be on Night Circus, his newest project and held his own. gnash came on after with his signature shades burning lavender incense and singing his face off, doing crooning Cali-type R&B (Daydreams was great). After gnash, there was a brief pause that led to a dimming of the lights that set the scene for what would be a lightsaber battle, the forces behind the lightsabers were SuperDuperKyle (of course the ‘good guys’ won) then proceeded to rap “I Got the Force.” Duels, choreographed dancing, high-energy and crowd surfing to “Really? Yea” balancing like a true Californian. That performance might’ve gone longer than anticipated because Blackbear’s absence but they made the fans heat up from the feet up so they didn’t mind. The main event came on a bit after and you could feel how pumped his die-hard fans were and I didn’t realize how big of a following he had here but I found out first-hand. I was amazed how the whole crowd knew every word of every song from beginning to end, their voices becoming more confident as the night carried on. They basically serenaded Hoodie with his own songs whether old or new.
