Hop Along played a surprise headlining show at Johnny Brenda’s Saturday night, which sold out within a few hours of going on sale.
On the heels of the release of their third and latest album, “Bark Your Head Off, Dog,” Philadelphia indie darlings — and arguably the best and most important band to emerge from the Philly music scene in the past five to 10 years — Hop Along played a surprise headlining show at Johnny Brenda’s Saturday night, which sold out within a few hours of going on sale. The show wasn’t announced until five days before the event.
After a rousing opening performance from Lucy Stone, Hop Along singer/guitarist and songwriter Frances Quinlan greeted fans while opening the show with first few verses of “Look of Love,” a slower track off the new album, easing the audience into the show. Soon after, the rest of the band — including guitarist Joe Reinhart, drummer Mark Quinlan, bassist Tyler Long and touring guitarist/keyboardist Chrissy Tashjian — joined in as people started singing along. Given that JB’s has a capacity of only 300 people at its upstairs venue, the show was limited only to the die-hards who were willing to purchase their entry to the show right at 10 a.m. when they went on sale last Tuesday. The band’s playing another sold out show May 19 at Union Transfer — a venue with four times the capacity.
Quinlan and Reinhart called out friends of theirs in the audience, giving the show a friendly and fraternal, everybody-here-knows-each-other kind of vibe. After “Look of Love,” the band kicked the energy up a notch with “Texas Funeral,” a favorite from sophomore album “Painted Shut,” a long-player released in 2015 that put the band on the map.
Hop Along showed off every song from “Bark Your Head Off” at some point in the setlist, exposing Fishtowners to the band’s new material. They didn’t forget their old stuff though: “The Knock,” “Powerful Man” and “Sister Cities” were among the other songs played from Painted Shut, while “Kids on the Boardwalk” and “Some Grace” also made appearances, both from the band’s debut album, Get Disowned.
Complete setlist:
Look of Love
Texas Funeral
Kids on the Boardwalk
How Simple
The Fox in Motion
Waitress
Somewhere a Judge
What the Writer Mean
How You Got Your Limp
Some Grace
One that Suits Me
Powerful Man
Sister Cities
Not Abel
Prior Things
Encore:
The Knock
Tibetan Pop Stars
