Yet again, Walnut Creek, California’s The Story So Far stood for a filled up venue in Eindhoven. Earlier this year, the band played in Dynamo with The American Scene opening up for them. During this European run the honors went out to Seahaven. Local band Call It Off opened up, which was their first show and apparently a great one – unfortunately I missed it. Their mix of Green Day and Blink 182 sounds to promising as they have a brand new EP out and a European tour ahead.

Seahaven from Torrance, California have built some hype for themselves since they started out in 2009 and this was the first time I had a chance to catch them live. Without having listened to any of their efforts, but their live video on The Waiting Room, I followed the hype and was eagerly waiting for the band to start their set. Four young lads entered the stage and started playing their songs confidently. Even though it was qualitatively good, Seahaven didn’t impress much. The vocals of singer Kyle Soto were rather boring, and musically guitarist Michael Craver, bassist Mike DeBartolo and drummer James Phillips didn’t bring any exciting highlights to the table. However, many of the kids present seemed to enjoy the show and were bouncing their heads to the widely ranging rhythms.

The Story So Far took over the stage shortly after and killed it, as expected. I don’t know how many songs they played, or for how long, but from the first track to the last the crowd went off. Old tracks like ‘Daughters’, ‘Mt. Diablo’, and ‘Roam’ were fluently mixed with tracks like ‘Stifled’, ‘Bad Luck’, and ‘Empty Space’ from their last album What You Don’t See. In May, the band played on an improvised stage in front of the bigger stage, but last night The Story So Far conquered the main stage. This didn’t withhold kids to stagedive or crowdsurf whatsoever, and limitless energy filled the room from start to end. Yet again The Story So Far impressed with an A+ performance.

Written by Tim van Reyswoud
Pictures by Stefanie Tan – www.stefanie-tan.blogspot.nl