Dan Mangan at the Danforth Music Hall (Toronto October 25, 2012)
Oh Dan Mangan is truly one of Canada’s National Treasures. He put on a simply fantastic show at the Danforth Music Hall last Thursday night. The Hall was full to capacity both on the floor and in the balcony (where I was seated). Even though I didn’t have the best of views it was nice to be off my feet after having worked all day and have Mr. Mangan humbly serenade and work the crowd.
Dan’s music evokes pure Canadiana. It’s warm, simple, cheeky and at the same time full of statements of introspection, how we can be better people and putting value in the moment. Listening to him live I was having visions of tall pine trees, road trips up north, relaxing in my condo on a rainy Sunday and pure bliss. His music can be described as gorgeous adult lullabies. On Thursday night, Dan and his 6 piece band played tunes from all three of his albums – which if you don’t have on your iPod, I recommend you upload asap.
The crowd knew all of the words to his tunes especially seen in sing alongs to ‘About As Helpful As You Can Be Without Being Any Help At All, Leaves, Trees, Forest and Rows Of Houses’. The vibe of the show resembled that of a ‘buddy’ coming home and playing a house show to his mates after being away for a while. It was laid back, sweet sing-alongs, Dan singing questions and audience members answering them in song, quiet moments of anecdotes and full of love for the crowd and the artist.
I really like the Danforth Music Hall as a venue. The people that man the doors along with the ushers are very cool and take care of the audience. I arrived just in time and the female usher in the balcony at first said try ‘sitting up there’ but when I said it was just for me she pointed out a cool spot. Class act Danforth Music Hall. That said, even with the amount of people in the DMH – there was no weird obnoxiousness emanating in the crowd. People were there to have a jolly time.
Dan Mangan, Juno award winner? Dude needs to rewrite our national anthem.
