elbow @ The Wiltern – 5.28.14 
All photos by Ben Irwin.
Ed. Note: I should be honest and concede that when elbow (do I capitalize the “E”?) first hit the tints of my scene over a decade ago, I was in no mood for another UK take on grey pop and the long, slow rain of love gone missing and wrong no matter how lovingly assembled or desperately accomplished.
I was too busy learning to get pissed, fucked and screwed, clinging to some loose idea of punk jungle rules.
But now I’m a man, goddamnit and I can handle my liquor, my women and (for the most part or not, sometimes…SHUT UP!) my feelings so when I heard “My Sad Captains” (off 2014’s The Take Off and Landing of Everything) in the van on the way to another bourgeois demolition the other day not only was I able to listen to the band’s warm, articulate woe but I really rather enjoyed the time I got to spend in traffic with it.
I know that’s not the most glowing endorsement but it’s a real, legitimate something for me so much so that I was more than a bit envious of El Jefe’s recent chance to see elbow play their last US show (for a minute, at least) at The Wiltern, the other day. All reports intimate they’re positively transcendent live and his report back sure looks to testify.
Now dig, if you will, his pictures.
