Cobra Starship is a guilty pleasure of mine (pun not intended). They have quite a different brand of music that I typically listen to.

I first heard of them prior to seeing them at GIAN 2008 as they were listed as one of the bands on the bill. Saw them again in 2009 at King’s College in London which is the best show of theirs which I’ve been to.

This was way before a Gossip Girl joined then for a song after which, they shot up in popularity.

This popularity was quite evident when I arrived at Shepherd’s Bush Empire, just a few minutes before the doors opened. I was greeted to a massive queue which is pretty much non-existent for previous gigs I’ve been to at O2 Empire.

Luckily, I am with O2 and was able to jump the queue by using the O2 customer’s priority entrance. This marked the first time I used this perk and was glad I had it as it was freezing cold outside.

The first support band was Plastiscines which is an all female band from France. By female, I mean girls as in teens. One could swear that they were plucked right out of Gossip Girl being pretty, slim, sexy and all. It was fun watching them especially this moment when the bassist tripped on stage. As for their music, their wasn’t anything real special about it.

Family Force 5 was the second support band and they came up on stage wearing the same shirts. Their music belongs to genre called Crunkcore (screamo+crunk) which I had no idea ever existed. Most of the crowd loved them. Their stage presence and energy was pretty remarkable. Not my cup of tea though.

It eventually came to Cobra Starship’s turn. They were mostly their usual selves except for Gabe being way too chatty. He talked so much between songs. Some of it were stories he already told in previous gigs which made the experience even more painful. As a result, their setlist was only 14 songs. With less talking, they could have squeezed in 2-3 more.

• The City Is At War
• Pete Wentz Is The Only Reason We’re Famous
• Nice Guys Finish Last
• Kiss My Sass
• My Moves Are White (White Hot ,That Is)
• Wet Hot American Summer
• The Church of Hot Addiction
• Send My Love to the Dancefloor, I’ll See You in Hell (Hey Mister DJ)
• Smile For The Paparazzi
• Snakes On A Plane (Bring It)
• Hot Mess
• Guilty Pleasure
• The Scene Is Dead; Long Live The Scene
• Good Girls Go Bad

An interesting moment was during Snakes On A Plane’s rap portion where they asked two members of the crowd to come up on stage and rap the stanza out. It was pretty cool.

Like at King’s College, I was hoping they would play “The World Has Its Shine (But I would Drop It on A Dime)” but they didn’t My guess is it’s too slow a song for their usual uptempo sets.

To sum up, although it was really good, it was not the best Cobra Starship show I’ve been to. This honour still goes to King’s College. Everything was simply better there including the support bands. Also, King’s College was a much smaller venue.

At the moment, I think after seeing Cobra Starship thrice, I’ve had my fix and it is quite unlikely I’ll be seeing them again lest be subjected to the same stories Gabe will eventually blabber on about. Still, they are a guilty pleasure of mine, and if the stars do align, I may just see them again.