December 09, 2012 -- Columbus, OH -- Nada Surf, Endless Summers

Venue: The Basement

This was one of a few Nada Surf shows that I attended because my girlfriend at the time was way into them. I came to enjoy their music as well and especially liked their “big” album ‘Let Go’.

This venue has the distinction of being very small and also having bad sight lines. We were two people from the stage and packed into the “pit” and it was not comfortable. When Nada Surf played you could see people had completely filled the pit and were on all the stairs behind the pit as well as the area around the pit. With low ceilings and the way the venue is set up, the people in the back just couldn’t see anything.

I don’t remember many specific details about the performance, but Nada Surf always put on a solid show.

A guy kept yelling for them to play their song ‘Killian’s Red’ and in the small venue it was super annoying, because everyone heard him. They were either planning on playing it anyway or they buckled and then they played it.

Then the guy started yelling for ‘Hyperspace’, and they played that too.

The lead singer Matthew Caws stayed after the show and played a couple of songs on acoustic guitar out in the venue out past where the crowd could see. It was actually pretty cool. He seemed like a genuinely kind guy.