Fucking in the Streets

“Well, it’s official,” said Jeremy Enigk between songs at the
Paramount on Friday night. “We are Sunny Day Real Estate, back
from a long sleep.” It had been 15 years since the band last played
Seattle with their full original lineup, the quartet responsible for
the band’s landmark mid-’90s albums Diary and LP2, and
they seemed genuinely happy—and humbled—to be there onstage again. This was the final night of a warmly received reunion
tour, and the band was in fine form, sounding like they hadn’t aged a
day since their sudden split in 1995. Enigk greeted the crowd with just
a “Wow, hello,” before the band launched into “Friday” and “Seven,” the
opening tracks, respectively, of their sophomore and debut albums. It
was a hell of a way to start the triumphant homecoming show.

The concert concentrated on those two records, those featuring the
“classic” lineup, although the band also made room for material from
their late-’90s incarnation as a trio as well as a pretty stunning
new song written since the band’s regrouping this year. Throughout,
they proved themselves to still be masters of that old loud-quiet-loud
dynamic, of contrasting and conflating emotions—a kind of
ecstatic sadness alternating with rage and calm. They’re also clearly a
product of their time and place, though, as much textbook emocore as
they are at times almost “grunge” or “alternative rock,” with Enigk’s
voice approaching the dreaded “yarl” when he really strains it
screaming.

The band didn’t speak much between songs (Enigk’s always been a
dramatically soft-spoken, often unintelligible frontman), but when they
did, they were exceedingly gracious. And they were plenty emotive in
song. Enigk gently swayed as if tethered to the microphone or contorted
his (weirdly delicate) face with screams during the band’s many
climatic crescendos. SDRE may cite U2 as a significant musical
influence, but there’s a world of difference between the bands’ live
personas: Whereas Bono goes for outsized messianic poses, Enigk
comes across as a penitent disciple, almost monkish with his
bald-shaved head. Backing him, William Goldsmith pounded and
reached behind his drum kit, Nate Mendel swiveled a little stiffly at
the hips (a move you may recognize from a few Foo Fighters videos), and
the whole band rocked out, headbanging or at least nodding hard on the
heavier riffs.

About their new song: It featured a bright, arpeggiated guitar line
(maybe a little reminiscent of the organ intro of “Baba O’Riley”?), a
slow-churning rhythm that erupted into a huge drumroll, and Enigk
singing lines about “falling out of grace,” “falling deeper,” and
finally, optimistically, “crawling out of hell,” with Enigk concluding,
as if to sanctify the band’s reunion and hint at more new material to
come, “It’s getting sweeter, I can tell.” It was a truly
promising new song.

Things peaked with the epic “In Circles,” the first song of the
band’s (obviously obligatory) encore. Enigk sang, “Sincerity/Trust in
me,” and it really felt like this was a band unfrozen from a time
before irony—they’re a big, shamelessly emotional band,
and you really get the feeling that they believe every word. “Running
down,” maybe, but this was without question a victory lap.