{"id":22897,"date":"2020-02-18T23:11:26","date_gmt":"2020-02-19T04:11:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/?p=22897"},"modified":"2020-02-18T23:15:35","modified_gmt":"2020-02-19T04:15:35","slug":"review-the-jungle-giants-sonia-2-6","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/2020\/02\/18\/review-the-jungle-giants-sonia-2-6\/","title":{"rendered":"REVIEW: The Jungle Giants @ Sonia 2\/6"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Sarah Burnick<\/em><\/p>\n

From the bar to the merch table, ecstatic energy reverberated throughout Cambridge\u2019s Sonia on the evening of February 6th, with indie-pop bands The Jungle Giants and Little Image bringing an unforgettable set to an otherwise gloomy Boston day.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Clad in hand-decorated suits, with statements like \u201cNORMALIZE\u201d and \u201cCOMPENSATE\u201d scrawled across the fabric, Texas-locals Little Image brought the energy to fill up a venue twice the size of the Sonia. The crowd may not have been ready for the body-pulsing experience the band was giving out, but their songs and performance was powerful to say the least.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Each song, packed with intensity and coupled with their energetic onstage presence, made for a punchy, memorable set unlike other angsty indie-rock bands. Every ounce of energy they were putting out should have been easily absorbed by a willing and ready crowd. Honestly, the east coasters \u2013 still bundled in their coats \u2013 were having a hard time swallowing their head-banging, body-thrashing, heart-wrenching vibe. Nonetheless, the edgy trio delivered an energizing and dynamic statement at the Sonia, debuting their newly-released single \u201cWorth It\u201d and favorites like \u201cBottles\u201d to a new audience.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Kicking off their first show in the United States, the old friends from Brisbane, Australia amped the crowd up with the track \u201cQuiet Ferocity\u201d from The Jungle Giants\u2019 2017 album. They demonstrated their magical ability to entrance the crowd with their exploding energy, bringing the sound and electricity to fill a festival\u2019s mainstage. The heavy beat and tantalizing guitar riffs, lead by the brains of the operation Sam Hales, made grooving along impossible to resist. Each song eases into a climax, and with each climax Sam had the entire crowd in a frenzy, unable to help themselves from jumping and moving their entire bodies.<\/span><\/p>\n

The four-piece \u2013\u00a0made up of Hales, Andrew Dooris, Cesira Aitken, and Keenan Bijker \u2013 threw it back with hits \u201cShe\u2019s a Riot\u201d and \u201cAnywhere Else\u201d\u00a0 from their 2013 release <\/span>Learn to Exist <\/span><\/i>with a performance that was truly larger than life. By integrating songs old and new into the set, everyone in the crowd was engaged, singing along to \u201cOn Your Way Down\u201d and \u201cBlinded\u201d from their most recent album.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

With each song the Aussies took it up a notch. Starting the set at seemingly 100 percent, somehow with every song the energy and power they brought was exponentially amplified.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

What made this show so particularly special was the level of intimacy that Hales set as a precedent for the entire set. Throughout the night, Hales made individual connections with practically everyone in the crowd, be it asking for help tying his shoelace, recognizing and appreciating those who sang along, or pointing at and making eye contact with individual concert-goers. Their excitement to be connecting with an audience across the world radiated. It was a vibe I have never experienced before, as I have never felt safer going to a concert by myself. The feeling that everyone had each other\u2019s back, including the band members on stage, was so unique and special.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

They kept our hearts racing with \u201cI Am What You Want Me to Be\u201d and \u201cFeel the Way I Do,\u201d keeping the dance party going strong the entire night. With whispers of new projects in the upcoming months, The Jungle Giants debuted their newest single \u201cSending Me Ur Loving\u201d in the U.S., which can only be described as absolutely killer. Every song blew the crowd away, cranking the level of energy through the roof with each and every song, letting it bounce off them and amplify it back into the audience.<\/span><\/p>\n

All good things must come to an end, but not without a bang. The foursome did just that with an insane performance of \u201cHeavy Hearted\u201d that drove everyone off the walls. With a respectful and gracious goodbye, opting out of returning for a crowd-induced encore, The Jungle Giants left Boston with a thrilling rendition of \u201cBad Dream.\u201d Their sound and on-stage presence was so exciting, engaging, and overall amazing, making the small rock club feel like Coachella, but the intimacy of the venue made the crowd feel like it was made entirely up of friends, grooving along together.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Sarah Burnick From the bar to the merch table, ecstatic energy reverberated throughout Cambridge\u2019s Sonia on the evening of February 6th, with indie-pop bands The Jungle Giants and Little Image bringing an unforgettable set to an otherwise gloomy Boston day.\u00a0 Clad in hand-decorated suits, with statements like \u201cNORMALIZE\u201d and \u201cCOMPENSATE\u201d scrawled across the fabric, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":17168,"featured_media":22898,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1525],"tags":[327,1565,994,231],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22897"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/17168"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22897"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22897\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22902,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22897\/revisions\/22902"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22898"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22897"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22897"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22897"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}