Macayla Cook | Nov. 21, 2024
When WVUD was presented with the opportunity to go see Chase Atlantic on a press pass, I received a call within three minutes of the email going out. This call was from Becca, a friend of mine, the station’s production director, and, evidently, a pretty big Chase Atlantic fan. She immediately asked “do you want to do this?” I had not seen the email yet and was very confused, but once I figured out what was happening, I was on board. We clinched the passes and prepared to see Chase Atlantic at the Met in Philadelphia on October 30.
Let me preface this by saying I was at best a local fan of Chase Atlantic before this. I was definitely familiar with their more popular songs like “Friends,” “Meddle About,” and “Into It,” but I was deeply unfamiliar with pretty much everything they’ve released since I abandoned my Tumblr account in 2018. I heard the lead single off their recent album, “DIE FOR ME,” on TikTok and liked it, but didn’t feel a strong urge to explore the full extent of LOST IN HEAVEN. I knew their general sound and enjoyed it, but wouldn’t consider myself a fan, per say.
Following the concert, I definitely would consider myself a fan.
When we got to the venue, we collected our passes and went up to the top level of the Met to find our seats. Usually, press seats are either really good or really bad, but either way, they’re free, so we don’t complain. One uniquely odd aspect of these particular seats was that Becca and I were in completely different sections, both on the ends of aisles on opposite sides of the mezzanine. This seemed kind of funny, as the venue knew we were from the same station, but maybe they just wanted to be safe in case we hated each other. Thanks for that, Met Philly. Always looking out for us.
Before the show, I ended up just chilling in my seat, watching the crowd fill in and waving at Becca as she was escorted with the other photographers into the photo pit all the way down at the front of the stage. It was a show right before Halloween, so some members of the crowd were in costume (the band also wore costumes for a period of the show since they didn’t have a show on the actual holiday). The girls next to me were dressed as vampires, capes and all, which would’ve been really cool if they hadn’t been so clearly wasted. I got hit in the face a lot that night by many a vampirically accessorized hand.
The opener was a rapper called 24kGoldn, a name that sounded vaguely familiar. Later, I would learn this was because he had a song go viral on TikTok, which I think you could also tell from his performance. To his credit, he brought a lot of energy to the stage and encouraged the audience to vote, both good things, but he was very much giving TikTok performer for a lot of the time. The songs were very repetitive and seemed engineered to go viral in a way that felt, frankly, annoying to me.
The other thing throwing me off was his background while on stage. The stage was set up with what were essentially three sets of risers at different levels, presumably to house the band that was headlining the show. These risers were in front of a massive video screen. I felt a little bad for the intrepid 24kGoldn as he ran around trying to fill a stage clearly designed for more than one person, with the same confusing, untimed visual playing behind him over and over.
Y’all remember the old DVD menu logo that would bounce around the screen whenever you paused whatever Disney movie you were watching? The background was essentially that, but instead of DVD, it said 24k. It was kind of cool at first, as it changed color, bounced around all fun, and was timed so that on the first chorus, a bunch of the logos popped up and bounced around instead of just one! I thought that was cool and was excited to see what else he had up his sleeve.
Would you believe it turned out to be just that?
Now, that visual was fine. It wasn’t super grating or annoying, perfectly fine for an opening act. The problem I was having was that it wasn’t timed at all throughout the rest of his nearly 45-minute set, meaning it would go from one logo to a bunch of multicolored ones at completely random times. At one point, he was in the midst of the first verse of an acoustic guitar, phone-flashlight type of song and the background started going crazy again. It was just so disconcerting, it was almost comical.
In terms of good stuff, I will give 24kGoldn some credit for how engaging of a performer he is. It’s gotta be a tough gig being an opener, as you’re walking out to a crowd that may or may not know any of your music as one of the only things standing between them and the artist they actually paid money to see. At least this guy was running around and getting people to yell stuff out and appeared to be generally having a good time, which is always a good thing for an opening act. He wasn’t taking himself too seriously; he understood he was there to get the crowd hyped and hopefully pick up a couple extra streams here and there, which he did.
The only songs from the set I knew were “City of Angels” (a 2020 TikTok hit that I remember quite liking, actually) and “Mood,” a 2021 mega-viral collaboration with iann dior. My like of “City of Angels” was tempered by the finale of “Mood,” as I remember truly hating that song and, upon further investigation, I still do. iann dior, when I catch you.
At least it was a step-up from Chase Atlantic’s previous opener, the infamous Leah Kate. I will gladly take 24kGoldn over “twinkle twinkle, little bitch.”
Thus began the second intermission of the show, and you could really feel the excitement. Honestly, the Chase Atlantic crowd may have been one of the loudest crowds I’ve ever heard at a concert, and that’s saying a lot considering I’ve been to quite a few shows in my day. I do at this time want to shout out the few teens I saw with their parents, as my dad has told me to turn off “Into It” in the car before because they curse too much so taking a parent to the Chase Atlantic concert is truly crazy work. Those girls are brave.
Additional shout out to the drunk vampire girl next to me, who took a 10-second video of the photosensitivity warning that was plastered across the back video screens during the break. This would have been odd to me if I hadn’t looked over 24kGoldn’s set to see her fully scrolling through nearby restaurants on GrubHub. Drunk people are weird and hungry.
Finally, the show began, just over two hours after doors. The crowd was, as I mentioned previously, LOUD. And my first observation from the main set was that lead singer Mitchel Cave actually does sound like that in real life, which is crazy.
I always kind of wanted to see Chase Atlantic in concert just to see if their lead singer sounded the way he does on the mastered versions of their songs. In a very pleasing development, I can confirm that his voice is like that in real life! Not only that, but if there is one thing I learned about Mitchel Cave over the course of the band’s set, it is that he is going to riff for his life over the end of every song, and I felt like I was taking physical damage every time (in a good way). Like, I was genuinely, viscerally awed by his voice. Homie can SING.
The band started their show with a few hits: the familiar “DIE FOR ME,” a popular 2016 release called “Slow Down,” and “Consume.” After this, Becca returned to me (yippee!) and we snuck into two unoccupied seats so that we wouldn’t be alone the whole night. What commenced was a really impressive performance with some truly immaculate vibes.
The set list was peppered with songs off of LOST IN HEAVEN, which meant no one knew the words and I didn’t stick out too badly. Score! I also was content to just enjoy the combo of easily danceable songs and captivating visuals. Chase Atlantic clearly puts a lot of work into the aesthetic identity associated with their discography, meaning the screen behind them was a lot of fun to watch during the songs I didn’t know. Plus, there were cars in a bunch of them, so I’m sure Jamie would be hyped. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, check the 500 articles he’s written about cars on this very blog.
Some of my favorites from the show included my previous favorites like “OHMAMI” and “Into It,” but it also exposed me to quite a few Chase Atlantic songs that I’ve obsessed over in the days since the concert, particularly “HEAVEN AND BACK” (what a BANGER).
Other observations I wrote down included: “fully forgot he was an Australian jump scare,” “their fashion sense is like the street wear final boss respectively,” “he says ‘hands up’ a lot,” and “these guys ‘she said’ almost as much as the 1975 do.” I stand by all of these and will not be elaborating further, thank you.
The band also exhibited really great chemistry during the show. Two of the members are brothers and the third member is their best friend, so it wasn’t shocking, but they were interacting with each other and the crowd a lot. For one portion of the night, the band were in costume, and Mitchel yelled “and I am Aladdin!” to much confusion from the crowd, before yelling it again and everyone went insane. We also cheered for the time at one point after Mitchel briefly struggled to find the clock onstage. It was 9:59, a lovely time.
He also made a joke about Halloween in America being nice because we get candy, as opposed to the Australian version where children get “sticked,” meaning they are given sticks and told to beat each other. I do not know if this was serious and if it was, I am deeply concerned about Australia as a whole.
Finally, we reached the end of the show. The band performed “Church” and “Swim,” two of their biggest hits, before leaving the stage. After we all chanted a bunch, they arrived again to close out the show with “Friends,” which is their second most-streamed song (their first is in fact “Swim”). Last words we heard from Mitchel were a very loud riff of “fuck yeahhhhhh!”
Overall, a great show. I found myself very impressed with the vocals throughout the show, and I liked a lot of the songs despite not being super familiar.
I was not thrilled at the lack of “Meddle About,” my personal favorite Chase Atlantic song, which confused me a little bit since it’s their seventh most popular song on streaming. However, this continues a long line of press pass concerts missing one of my favorite popular songs from an artist, as Greta Van Fleet also didn’t play “Safari Song.” I believe I may be cursed, ultimately, but what’s done is done.
In the end, I recommend going to see Chase Atlantic. The lead singer has questionable hair but a hell of a voice, the songs are catchy, and the vibes are overall perfect for a fun night out. Give it a shot (just not with your dad).