We Were Promised Jetpacks fuel up in Chicago

Thursday, March 11, 2010, at Lincoln Hall

By Genevieve Diesing
Published: March 14th, 2010 | 11:00am

The nearly hysterical reception meeting We Were Promised Jetpacks in Chicago didn’t seem to faze Adam Thompson — it was the venue. “We’ve never played in a place that has a balcony before,” the singer said of the packed Lincoln Park theater.

Surprising news for a young Scottish group whose 2009 debut These Four Walls (Fat Cat) — full of quick-tempo-ed yet anguished rock songs — caught so many independent radio DJs’ ears that the foursome quickly set out on an American tour. The album’s blasting percussion, soaring strings, tortured vocals, and somber refrains show a depth that contradicts the assumption that this is just another trendy group with an ironic name.

The assumption was easy to make based on the long buildup to the performance (there were two openers and Jetpacks didn’t start until after 11 p.m.). In addition to a lengthy wait after the last opener, The Lonely Forest (a promising rock quartet in their own right), the Jetpacks set was preceded by a long audio track featuring a robotic voice that recited numbers. Was this meant to tie into Jetpacks’ name, which suggests a pre-modern reference to technology in our millennium? It wasn’t clear, but the over-hyped buildup seemed awkward for an otherwise humble band that seemed to be working to keep it real.

“We’ve got two songs left, not two songs and then we hide back there for five minutes,” Thompson joked towards the end of the set. “There’s no Santa Claus; there’s no encore.”

The frankness was charming, but Thompson’s real magnetism came through in his somber vocal delivery, such as in the reverent anthem “Quiet Little Voices” which was lush and frantic. Songs like ”Roll Up Your Sleeves” and “Keeping Warm” were powered by thundering drums and machine gun rolls that paired nicely with Thompson's yearning calls. The group slowed down a little with the melancholy “A Far Cry” off The Last Place You’ll Look, a 5-song EP released March 9, but gained excitement with “It’s Thunder and It’s Lightning,” a song patterned by shrieks of anguished vocals.

Apparently, there were more than enough female fans to feel Thompson’s pain, not limited to the rows of thrashing girls at Lincoln Hall. “In Denver there were 30 girls constantly screaming,” Thompson admitted.

The shrills must have helped the group to power on as the quartet maintained hyper vocal power with persistently heavy drumbeats and melodic guitars through its set — proving that, if needed, they had enough energy to fuel those so-called jetpacks. Let’s hope they spend it on another full-length album instead.

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We Were Promised Jetpacks MySpace page

The Lonely Forest MySpace page

Fat Cat Records