Sadly I wasn’t able to make last week’s Death Cab show in Bellingham, so I passed my ticket on to local music enthusiast Scott D. Here is his report from the show:

The air was electric with anticipation. The lights went out as smoke and a droning ambient noise filled the room. The crowd went wild. Lead singer Ben Gibbard’s voice soared over the fray, marking Death Cab For Cutie’s long awaited return to Bellingham. It’s been ten years since the band has played here in our basements and bars since forming in 1997 as a collection of Western undergrads, but let there be no doubt, this is not the band you identified with in college. These were true rock stars. It must be hard to come back and play the ‘hometown’ show after so long; the high expectations from the crowd, heavy local media and smalltime bloggers making a big deal of it. But the fact is, these guys are professionals, and damn good ones too. Plus, it was cool to hear the familial shout-out to Josh and Chris at Barsuk, the label that launched Death Cab’s first album, and the admission by Ben that, yes indeed, Death Cab For Cutie was from Bellingham. Hooray for recognition!

The set itself was very upbeat and danceable, and kept the energized crowd on their feet all the way through the encore. Playing songs that spanned their six studio-album career (as well as a handful of EP’s), the band even touched on some new material, said to be holdouts from the Narrow Stairs album, and heard on the new ‘The Open Door” EP. Opening the show was Syracuse, N.Y. band and Barsuk label mates Ra Ra Riot, a really talented band that has recently released an amazing second album. Unfortunately for them (and all of us), the sound crew was still getting the bugs worked out during their set, detracting from an otherwise energetic live performance. Death Cab’s sound filled the hallways of the Mount Baker Theatre during tracks like the hauntingly catchy, “I Will Possess Your Heart,” and the poppy, “The Sound Of Settling.” Gibbard’s solo performance of, “I Will Follow You Into The Dark,” had the crowd singing and swaying along; everyone from the old woman there on the advice of her daughter, to the teen die-hards, to the couple that just discovered them last week. And as I stood there looking around, swimming in the lights, singing along with every word, it struck me that Death Cab For Cutie was definitely no longer Bellingham’s wonderful little secret, they were bona fide rock stars.