In what was either a brilliant marketing move or an utter act of lunacy, Sweden’s The Hives booked their album release tour in support of The Death of Randy Fitzsimmons at the unlikeliest of venues, finding themselves at San Francisco’s Bimbo’s 365 Club on a Sunday night.
Sure, it’s been over a decade since they dropped their last album, but it’s not surprising that the show sold out quickly and the line was wrapped around the block leading in advance of doors. Afterall, when are you going to get your next chance to see these legends at one of the finest clubs in San Francisco with maybe 700 people? When the doors opened, there was a quick dash to the front of the small stage for what would expectedly and undeniably result in a night of utter mayhem.
Kate Clover kicked things off with a ripping 30 minutes set that no doubt won over a few new fans. But let’s face it, the San Francisco crowd was here for one reason alone, the Hives. Taking the stage promptly at 9 p.m., the band quickly launched into the opening track from The Death of Randy Fitzsimmons, “Bogus Operandi.” Clearly the San Francisco fans had enough time for the new tunes to roll around inside their heads, and frontman “Howlin’ Pelle” Almqvist delighted in watching the crowd singing along while smushed up against the stage.
While the set was replete with plenty of new tunes, the hour-and-15-minute performance came with plenty of antics and humor that at the end of the day was simultaneously both the best performance by the Hives and most entertaining music infomercial anyone in the room had likely ever seen. One can only imagine that The Hives will be back soon at a much larger scale and, after that epic closer of “Tick Tick Boom,” I’m sure there will be 700 people telling all their friends that it’s not a show to be missed!
The Hives
Kate Clover
