By Morgan Jones

As the sun began to set, the doors of Showbox Sodo in Seattle, Washington opened to the hundreds of dedicated fans that had been waiting outside the venue for hours to see LANY. LANY, who has been on a nearly sold out 100+ date world tour since the beginning of February, added this show due to high demand– and the impressive line prior to doors made it clear just how high that demand was. After releasing their first EP in 2015, LANY has managed to take over the indie pop world with close to 6 million monthly listeners on Spotify and millions of YouTube views. Their most recent album, Malibu Nights, solidified their success and the band has been on tour to promote it ever since.

The sold out show quickly became packed right before opener, Sasha Sloan, walked on stage promptly at 8PM. After her first song, Sasha introduced herself and exclaimed how grateful she was that LANY brought her on this leg of the tour. Throughout her 30 minute set, she took the time to explain the meanings and thought processes behind each song. Although her songs contained lyrics full of pain, with topics ranging from losing friends to divorce, they were backed by heavy synth and melodic pop beats; which helped lighten the heavy lyrical content. Sasha captivated the audience with her relatable lyrics and personality as she proved to the perfect emotional pop warm up to LANY‘s headlining set.

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After 30 minutes of anxious waiting, the lights turned completely off and the crowd erupted with applause. The LED screen lit up with an old VHS filter and the words “LANY Malibu Nights” scribbled over it. Moments after that message appeared on the LED screen, band members Les and Jake stepped onto stage to take their places. The crowd became silent in anticipation for lead singer Paul Klein to take the stage, only to erupt with cheers yet again as he ran onto stage with a beaming smile as the melody of “Thick and Thin” began to play. After the first song, Paul told the crowd how grateful the band was to be in Seattle, and how thankful he was that they got to play not one, but two sold out shows there. After expressing his gratitude, Paul asked the crowd if everyone was ready to dance with him tonight because he hated dancing alone; once the crowd agreed to dance Paul strapped on his guitar and began to play the fan favorite “Good Girls.” Soon enough it seemed like the crowd was singing the lyrics louder than Paul was over the speaker system.

After the 5^th song, “I Don’t Wanna Love You Anymore,” Paul put put away his mic to jump down into the photo pit in order to crawl into the sea of fans– quickly sinking into the thousands of fans that engulfed him. After hugging and thanking the fans from the crowd, he finally made his way back to the stage to play crowd favorites like “Taking Me Back,” “Valentine’s Day,” and “If You See Her.” Before performing “The Breakup,” the band stopped the music so that Paul could share a story with everyone. He talked about how when LANY first started they were playing small bar venues, and they found this sound guy they really bonded with every time they played that same venue. At the time LANY didn’t have a big budget so they kept telling the sound guy that one day they would be able to afford him and take him on tour; Paul then then pointed to the sound booth and told the crowd to say hi to him, as they finally were able to take him with them.

For “final” song, LANY played “Malibu Nights,” during which Paul took a seat next to his keyboard and was bathed in a dim shimmery blue light. As the crowd sang along Paul smiled from pure happiness before joining the rest of the band at the end to walk off stage. The crowd screamed for an encore and no fan dared to move until they reappeared on stage. After minutes of waiting the boys finally came back out and immediately started playing “Thru These Tears” followed by “ILYSB.” After pouring out their hearts in their encore, the band took a final bow together and ended their first sold out night in Seattle.