Silver Beams Gold as Moist Brings Canadian Alt. Rock Classic to Bronson Centre

Before we sling some Silver with David Usher and the Moist boys (a band name I’d bet an unencumbered ride on the LRT was only bypassed for the shorter Moist due to it fitting better on album covers), I gotta’ give props to the new digs over at the Bronson Centre. No, waits, my apologies, the Bronson Centre Music Theatre.

If you haven’t been to the former 1920s nun run school  turned office space turned one O-town’s hidden gems of concert hubs, you owe yourself a visit. Heck, even the Wikipedia page will throw you as it mentions seats! Renos have removed those, opened up the floor space, added a few bars and turned it into a full-fledged zone to get your 90s alt rock on!

Did I mention it looks as though they upgraded their lighting and sound, a fact, dare I say it, Moist would “Push” to the max. (I hereby solemnly swear that shall be the final “Push” pun in this article or else I will turn in my reviewer badge)

So the cavalcade of 90s rock that heated up collage radios continues. Our Lady Peace and Bush whet some appetites at City Folk in September with Moist ready to heap up another helping, this night to a near packed crowd filling in the spots where those Bronson Centre chairs used to be.

The boys are on tour to brush a new coat of varnish on Silver, their 1994 debut album that gave us hits like the titular track, “Believe Me” and, of course, “Push”. That last tune was everywhere that year, helping the album to 4X Platinum status. Not too shabby for something that only cost ‘em four grand to make. While some of the stuff coming out at the same time doesn’t really hold up, this Silver still beams with power crowds, pulse pounding drums and Usher’s angst filled wail.

Bonus rocker points for doing it all while recovering from a concussion. Seems David got clipped recently by a car, he told the crowd, adding that it was the first day in a little while that he was feeling good.

“Let’s see how it goes tonight because I think tomorrow is going to be a pretty sad morning,” said Usher before launching into his 2001 solo cut “Black Black heart 2.0”. If he hadn’t had said anything, I doubt the audience would have noticed. No missteps here and while he wasn’t stage diving like he did back when I saw the band in my college days,  the frontman did hop off the stage the get a little closer to the crowd.

It’s always amazing as a reviewer to see how much an audience values the bands they continue to follow long passed the peak of the mountain. During “Silver”, I think Usher was personally taken aback by the adoration as the audience nearly drowned out the spiffy new sound system by how loudly they sung the chorus.

“25 years ago…holy fuck,” Usher exclaimed, like he couldn’t believe those over two decades weren’t just yesterday and they weren’t still a group first hearing their tunes on the radio while driving around Vancouver.

But music never dies, man, and while this Silver only turned to platinum it was all gold last night. Gotta’ think they’ll still be rocking out when #50 roles around!

Oh yeah, Happy Birthday Jeff!