(June 5, 2012)  Last night I was able to catch Ramona Falls launching their east coast tour to support their new album, “Prophet”.  Opening the show was the band Darcy from Toronto; a shoegaze band who definitely played that part.  The Darcy set was full of distortion and a lot of time tinkering with their effect pedals creating an unengaged set.  The main reason I wanted to check out Darcy was their odd choice for their second album-a remake of the Steely Dan album AJA.  For my taste I would have appreciated more AJA covers and less Darcy originals.

Ramona Falls is the current project of Brent Knopf who is a former member of Menomena.  Brent has a wonderful stage presence which was a distinct difference between Ramona Falls and Darcy.  The band has a classic pop sound with heavy keyboards and synth while the lyrics were layered nicely to give their performance a very audience-friendly performance.  There were some brief technical difficulties in the light show which when it was working was a great compliment to the music; although 7th Street Entry can be difficult given the unique angles.  I would like to see them in a larger venue with the ability to see the lighting presentation and really show the work of Drummer Paul Alcott who was responsible for the backing presentation.

Ramona Falls is from Portland, Oregon-a circle city to Minneapolis when it comes to having an inviting local music scene.  I saw many parallels of how appreciative Ramona Falls was of the audience response that we are familiar from Minnesota artists.

Ramona Falls in the tight confines of 7th Street Entry!