Cold Fronts SXSW Kickoff Show @ Kung Fu Necktie.

March 4, 2013

by gwmiller3

Text by Nikki Volpicelli. Images by Rick Kauffman.

Cold Fronts played a going away show at Kung Fu Necktie Thursday night with TJ Kong and the Atomic Bomb.

The show marked the second night of Cold Fronts’ SXSW Kick-Off tour before they headed down south to Austin. The energy was high on stage (and off, by default). This is an exciting time of year as groups from around the world head to SXSW for two weeks of networking, performing, drinking, sunning, taco eating, more performing and little sleeping.

After pounding through “Better and Better,” Cold Fronts’ front man Craig Almquist pulled a red shirt out of nowhere.

“T-shirts! Ten Fucking Dollars!” he barked at the crowd. “Its a meeeeedium!”

“Throw it! Throw it! Throw it!” you could hear, as a good chunk of the crowd pined over the “Rat Beach” cloth.

“This is so lame!” he said as the crowd kind of bullied him to throw the shirt.

Then he suggested need for a T-shirt gun. They kept on giving shit away. (Editor’s note: we heard that City Rain’s Ben Runyan shamelessly snatched a flying shirt out of a Cold Fronts fan’s hands). Drummer Alex Smith got up from his set to give a lucky audience member a tallboy.

“You know something’s wrong when the drummer’s just leaving the drums,” said Almquist before pushing into “Primetime,” from the group’s debut album, Pretty American (it’s amplified/reverb sound is comparable to the early recordings by The Strokes).

Nothing was wrong, though. The guys were having fun and it was obvious. There was no stress to make this the best performance of all time. It was a party with friends and family before it was anything else and conversation was flowing back and forth onstage and off.

After the group’s initial visit to the festival last year, the (then) four-piece played dozens of street performances, one of which Andrew W.K. joined to fall over Smith’s drum set.

They have really big shoes to fill but the guys are prepping well. Vitamin Water is a Cold Fronts sponsor and the company gave the group enough bottles to fill up every inch of their tour van.

“We’re not sure there’s going to be room for equipment,” Almquist joked after the show.