{"id":859,"date":"2020-11-27T02:17:00","date_gmt":"2020-11-27T02:17:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/?p=859"},"modified":"2026-06-27T02:21:14","modified_gmt":"2026-06-27T02:21:14","slug":"the-shins","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/?p=859","title":{"rendered":"The Shins"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

October 2004, Iceland Airwaves, Reykjavik, Iceland<\/strong><\/p>\n

I\u2019ve always wanted to go to Iceland, with its volcanoes and geysers, Northern lights and hot water springs. It\u2019s exotic and intriguing, a land during part of the year where there is no sun. When my wife and I got married, we wanted to be able to travel overseas each year if we could, and we targeted 2004 year for Iceland, with the slogan \u201c2004 \u2014 The Ice is going to break.\u201d It was an homage to the Dead Zone<\/em>, and it doesn\u2019t make much sense, but it still makes me laugh.<\/p>\n

So . . .<\/p>\n

Each year Iceland hosts a festival called Iceland Airwaves, and a travel special was put in place for a five-day package including hotel, flight and a full pass to the festival. It was a merging of two things I love \u2014 travel and music.<\/p>\n

Airwaves mainly showcases the music of Iceland (and there\u2019s plenty of it, most of it great) but invites a varied number of musicians from around the world to play. Joining 40 Icelandic bands including Holt Hora, Bruderbandio and Hjalmar were Keane, The Stills, Four Tet, Hot Chip, The Bravery and The Shins (to name a few). My wife was excited to see Keane, whose debut album was causing a great stir, while I had my eye on The Stills and The Shins. Turns out they played back-to-back at a downtown bar on the festival\u2019s third night.<\/p>\n

At this point, The Shins were blowing up. After the scene in Garden State declared the song New Slang \u201cwill change your life,\u201d The Shins became the band of the moment. Chutes Too Narrow<\/em>, the album released the year before, became an instant best-seller and everyone was learning about this band from Albuquerque. Seeing them in a smaller venue while the green Northern lights danced outside was about as great as it gets.<\/p>\n

There was a dilemma. Keane was slated to play about the same time as The Stills and The Shins at a different venue, so I had to make the decision (as you usually do during most festivals). My wife stayed with Keane, and I headed to get a spot for The Shins \u2014 I was told you wouldn\u2019t be able to get in if you got there late.<\/p>\n

I got there as Singapore Sling was playing, a metal band from Iceland which had the crowd captivated. The room had low ceilings and looked like it held no more than 200 people \u2014 but there was way more there this night. The stage was slightly elevated in the back corner \u2014 the crowd was right up on the band \u2014 and with low light and spraying beer, it was a full on bacchanal.<\/p>\n

The Stills came on shortly after \u2014 Logic Will Break Your Heart<\/em> is one of my top album of the aughts first decade \u2014 and the band from Montreal cranked out songs from the album at a high, high decibel level. I looked over and saw a couple of people singing along with every word, as I was, and we exchanged a knowing look of our good fortune.<\/p>\n

The Shins came out to riotous applause \u2014 this was a showcase band of the festival, and the people in the room that night knew it. While James Mercer is the voice and composer of the band\u2019s songs, keyboardist Marty Crandall served as the band\u2019s banter man for the night, joking with the crowd and introducing the songs during the hour set.<\/p>\n

The aforementioned New Slang<\/em> had the crowd rocking back and forth, but it was the peppy So Says I that sent the room into a frenzy. The “woo-oh-woo-hoo” portion was a laughing, screaming mass of drunken all-night partiers in their element, raising up $10 pints in joyous unison. It would be the best show in a series of many on this trip.<\/p>\n

At the airport waiting to board the plane back to the States, I looked over and there were The Shins, getting on the same plane as we were. After boarding, I noticed James Mercer was sitting just a few rows back and my wife and I thought it would be cool to see if he might sign the mini-magazine we got at the festival. Since I\u2019m terrible about talking to musicians I admire, my wife (who is not afraid to talk to anyone), walked over mid-flight and had nice conversation with him and got the signature.<\/p>\n

He wrote \u201cTak Tak!\u201d which essentially means \u201cthanks,\u201d though it should be me thanking The Shins.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

October 2004, Iceland Airwaves, Reykjavik, Iceland I\u2019ve always wanted to go to Iceland, with its volcanoes and geysers, Northern lights and hot water springs. It\u2019s exotic and intriguing, a land during part of the year where there is no sun. When my wife and I got married, we wanted to be able to travel overseas […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":860,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[116,115],"class_list":["post-859","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-concerts","tag-iceland-airwaves","tag-the-shins"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/859","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=859"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/859\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":861,"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/859\/revisions\/861"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/860"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=859"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=859"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=859"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}