The World/Inferno Friendship Society—Baltimore 4/22/16

I’ve been following (I guess using “following” kind of loosely—I know a lot of people who have traveled much further than I have) the World/Inferno Friendship Society for over a year now. The last time I saw them was their huge Halloween show in Brooklyn, Hallowmas, so when I heard they were playing a show in Baltimore, I decided I had to go, despite it being kind of a journey to get there.

A friend I knew through the Matches is a huge fan and she introduced me to them because she knew I’d love the crowd. When I traveled to Baltimore for this show, I did the same thing for a friend I know through Coheed because I knew he’d love the crowd too.

I’d describe Inferno as weird and dancey but somehow still punk in a way. Max described them as folky punk, and a friend I brought to a Boston show a year ago described the live show at least as what she’d imagine a 1950’s punk show would be like.

Inferno is one of those bands that you can’t fully appreciate until you see live.

There’s something about the energy of the crowd that makes it so much more than you could imagine than just by listening to the music. I’d never been to a show in Baltimore before so I wasn’t sure if it would live up to the crowds I’d seen in New York and Boston, but it did.

It was enough to turn Max into an Infernite long before the night was even over.

Before we went to the show he was asking me what to expect, so I showed him a video of “Tattoos Fade” live where everyone’s doing the claw thing with their hands. (Or are we holding wine glasses? Not a clue.)

The show was at Metro Galley, which is a tiny little venue, but it was packed full of people. When “Tattoos Fade” started everyone was moving. The entire show there was a mosh pit and dancing and all the energy I could’ve hoped for.

They even played “Your Younger Man” which includes confetti getting thrown around a bit. I feel like they also played “Brother of the Mayor of Bridgewater” which is one of my favorites because I can Charleston and it works. I don’t think I had heard that one live before.

A few times I grabbed Max to waltz-mosh, even if there were maybe only two or three other sets of people doing the same. Inferno pits are one-of-a-kind, and it seems to be anything goes, aside from when the whole crowd is in on something specific.

For instance, the circle pit during “The Naughty Little Rat Makes New Friends”: They intentionally play it really slow in the beginning (like much slower than the album version of the song) so the crowd can start a slow circle pit that eventually erupts into utter chaos when the song picks up.

There were a few times when I was afraid Max was confused by the behavior of the crowd, but if he was he went along with it really well. Every time I saw him he was going nuts, losing his shit, moshing with the best of them even though he wasn’t super familiar with the music. Then he would find me between songs and say things along the lines of: “I like this. I’m a fan.”

This is supposed to be a review from me, but Inferno is already by far one of my favorite bands to see live if you haven’t yet figured that out. The success of the night was getting Max to agree. He said every show should be like an Inferno show. He’s not wrong. He even found Jack Terricloth at the end of the night to tell him this was his first time seeing them and that he was a fan now. I’ve never even spoken to Jack before and I’ve seen them at least a half dozen times at this point.

Have I seen better shows than this Baltimore show? Yes, I have. Hallowmas is going to be extremely hard to beat. But the crowd was an amazing one, and I have seen worse. And Inferno was as amazing as always.