The Matches (Oakland, CA), Crooked Teeth (San Diego, CA)
September 12th, 2026
Varsity Theater in Minneapolis, MN
According to the band, 18 years ago was the last time The Matches played here in Minneapolis. I didn’t know the band even existed back then as listening to Trivium’s newly released Shogun in 08 took up like all my time. Thanks to my now wife Jamie getting me into the band and the countless times we watched Bleeding Audio, I spent a lot of COVID time wishing I could see them but not really thinking it was gonna be possible. At least up here. Thus we went on our trip to HOB Chicago two years ago, where I finally got to experience first hand the intensity of a Matches live show. It’s been my first and only time at that venue, and the thing I’ll remember about it most forever, is how much of a bounce house it felt like during the Matches set. It was really hard to get good photos that night because of how unstable the floor was, but on top of that I was worried about just falling over entirely. Wondering about how safe the floor is and it’s going to collapse in on us crossed my mind to of course, but like it had to be okay right? The venue’s gotta know what they’re doing, right?
So when a show at Varsity Theater was announced, and for my favorite album? I knew I had to be there.
I’ve been two enough anniversary type tours where it’s usually done where the band plays the album front to back, or sprinkled throughout the set. The band did the latter style and it worked in the bands favor this time. “Audio Blood” and “Chain Me Free” and other songs from E. Von Dahl Killed the Locals sprinkled in in the middle and throughout help keep the night feeling fresh. At lease for me when reaching parts of Decomposer that lag a bit, compared to songs like “Didi (My Doe, Part 2)” and my favorite “Little Maggots”
Minneapolis got an extra song thrown into the set that Chicago didn’t the night before, a cover of Charlie XCX’s “Rock Music.” I wont pretend to have known about the song at all before hearing it here, but it sounded good! And it was fun! Shawn Harris, The Matches singer, said that they had just learned it during soundcheck.
The only hiccup of the night was when the band stopped playing to attend to what seem to me like a belligerently drunk guy causing a scene, which was taken care of in quick and proper order. Shawn then wanted to “sage the room,” after asking if everyone was okay, by getting everyone in the crowd to sit down or kneel and then jump up. There were a lot of joke about how we’re old or getting old, so he assured everyone that it’s okay to just get up at your own pace. There were a lot of other jokes throughout the set, like originally being upset at people that would meow during “Scratched Out” because they’re “Serious artists and you’re just gonna meow instead of sing?”
While the crowd wasn’t quite as rowdy as the last time I saw the band in Chicago, I could definitely tell that they still had their die hards along with them. Every one there seemed to genuinely love the band and the amount of times I heard about the band being just a good group of guys, was abundant. Which I got to experience personally throughout the night as I got to interact with each band member. Can confirm all being good dudes, and it warms my heart to know that I get to continue to support such a group.
And as always, I’ll leave a review of the Matches with my favorite lyric of theirs:
“May your organs fail before your dreams fail you.”
