First Times: Leaping head first into slowdive’s dreamy shoegaze at a sold-out Fox Theater Pomona

By Josh Herwitt //

slowdive with Drab Majesty //
Fox Theater Pomona – Pomona, CA
April 26th, 2024 //

When you live in a city as big as Los Angeles, it’s not everyday that you find yourself hopping on the 60 Freeway and embarking out to the county’s eastern edge for an evening of live music in Pomona.

But nearly 10 years after making the 45-mile trek on a weeknight to catch The Kills at The Glass House (read our show review here), I still found a good reason to do it again and endeavor trying to beat rush-hour traffic on a Friday in LA (pro tip: it takes a lot of patience).

P-Town, as the locals call it, is Goldenvoice CEO Paul Tollett’s backyard after all. It’s where he grew up and co-founded The Glass House with his brother Perry before teaming up with Goldenovice co-owner Rick Van Santen to conceive the $100 million idea that Coachella would eventually become almost two decades later.

But it was in 2007 when Tollett partnered with Ed and Jerry Tessier to purchase the historic Fox Theater Pomona, a fully restored Art Deco movie palace that remains one of the Pomona Arts Colony’s flagship attractions more than 90 years after opening. Constructed in the classic “Hollywood Style” and used by movie studios around Tinseltown to host sneak previews of their upcoming films, the building received $10 million’s worth of renovations when the Tessier family took control and restored it into a state-of-art music venue for audiences as large as 2,000.

With a capacity of that size, the Pomona Fox Theater can attract some top-notch acts every year and Tollett has seized the moment each April since 2012 by booking some big Coachella sideshows there, from Bon Iver and Modest Mouse to Blur and Jungle most recently. Yet, after all these years covering live music, it was English rockers slowdive who finally convinced me to head east again for my first trip to the Fox — and I’m glad that I didn’t miss it after being out of town during their two LA headline shows at The Bellwether in October.

slowdive, believe it or not, have been around for more than three decades at this point. The five-piece out of Reading was formed back in 1989 by primary songwriter Neil Halstead and Rachel Goswell but has remained intact despite a hiatus that lasted almost 20 years.

And with the group’s label parting ways after its first three studio albums were released by the mid-90’s, it wasn’t until 2017 a few years after reuniting when slowdive dropped their self-titled LP that captivated a whole new swath of fans, who quickly jumped on the bandwagon upon hearing dreamy cuts “Slomo”, “Star Roving”, “Sugar for the Pill” and our personal favorite, “No Longer Making Time” toward the end of the eight-track effort.

I will be perfectly honest and admit that I have not always been the biggest fan of shoegaze. The alt/indie-rock sub-genre that had exploded out of Ireland and the UK in the late 80’s when I was a youngster had escaped me amidst the hair-metal scene and subsequent tidal wave of grunge rock during the early 90’s that my older brother turned me onto. I had completely missed the boat on My Bloody Valentine until much later on and never found myself diving into RIDE or Lush, which left me largely unaware of the movement that has paved the way for more recent acts, including DIIV, Hotline TNT, bdrmm and even Silversun Pickups (Pitchfork actually published a piece on shoegaze’s revival prior to the end of last year, citing slowdive’s “phoenix-like rise from the ashes in recent years” here).

Back inside the Fox where a capacity crowd eagerly awaited their arrival onstage, Goswell (vocals, guitar, keyboards, tambourine), Halstead (vocals, guitar, keyboards), Nick Chaplin (bass), Christian Savill (guitar) and Simon Scott (drums) made their presence known just after 9 p.m. with the opening track to their fifth full length Everything Is Alive that arrived in September via Dead Oceans. But it was older material such as the ensuing “She Calls” from the band’s 1992 compilation Blue Day that caught us by surprise as the constant wash of guitar distortion and echoing vocals put us in a trance-like state for the remainder of slowdive’s 90-minute performance.

If there was anything from the show we could nitpick, it was probably that we didn’t get to hear “Slomo” after it was played a day earlier at The Majestic Ventura Theater, and while we had considered heading north for that date instead, our first time seeing slowdive was far from underwhelming. “Souvlaki Space Station” followed by “kisses” served as one highlight, while an encore beginning with what has become their most popular hit “Sugar for the Pill” and a cover of Syd Barrett’s “Golden Hair” that understandably felt psychedelic in its nature provided a euphoric ending for the long drive home. slowdive might not be the loud rock ‘n’ roll concert you are looking for, but there’s no question — effects pedals and all — that they have carved out quite the following since their reformation. Because with the way things have been trending for them of late, we sure hope they don’t slow (no pun intended) down anytime soon.

Setlist:
shanty
She Calls (started, and abruptly stopped by Rachel, then played in its entirety)
Star Roving
Catch the Breeze
Avalyn
skin in the game
Crazy for You
chained to a cloud
Souvlaki Space Station
kisses
Alison
When the Sun Hits
40 Days

Encore:
Sugar for the Pill
Golden Hair (Syd Barrett cover)