Tyler Hilton at The Space
Katie Monday night, Tyler Hilton played The Space in Hamden, CT. He is promoting his new CD, Forget the Storm, which comes out on April 3rd. Support for the show was Dakota & Will and Dion Roy. (As well as Sam Allesandrine but I came in during the last song of her set.)
I was a bit disappointed to see that Tyler did not have the CD available early to those of us who came out to the show, especially when it came out the next day, but with the big NYC CD bash being the next night, I kind of expected it. (I just ordered it from his website now – I hope it still comes signed even though it is now release day and not a pre-order!)
Anyway, back to the show! Dakota & Will (http://www.dakotaandwill.com/) are 2 guys from Nashville. At first I didn’t really like them, but I have to say as their set went on they started to grow on me. They describe themselves as ‘country pop that doesn’t suck’ and I think that description is pretty accurate. Will even went in the crowd during a song (while Dakota was singing) and gave a CD out to one of the girls in the crowd which I thought was pretty cool.
Next up was Dion Roy (http://www.dionroy.com) . I saw Dion Roy with Tyler once before, and I don’t think I was actually all that sold on him. However, I certainly was sold on him this show! His voice was great! (That’s all I can really go by because I was sitting in the back and couldn’t see the stage for most of the openers sets) He has a new CD coming out in June. I probably should have bought one of his older ones at the show but I guess I wasn’t thinking straight. (There’s always iTunes!)
Then Tyler came through the crowd and up on stage. He apologized for being out of breath and said that he had been dancing around to Carly Rae Jepsen’s “Call Me Maybe” and that Dakota and Will had turned him on to the song last night. (Random Fact: Both Tyler and Carly have opened for Hanson!) He also had his glasses on which he had not intended on wearing but forgot with all the rocking out to Canadian Pop Stars… I stood up for a few of his songs so that I was able to take some photos. I was pleasantly surprised that they turned out so well because usually the lighting at The Space is not that great, but I guess I found a nice spot to shoot from. Even sitting I could still see him, thank goodness he is soo tall! 🙂
He talked about how the new album was coming out the next night and that tonight was the last night that would be like this of the past before the album came out. He said he’d do some new and old stuff and that he did. Pink and Black was shouted out from the crowd and The Letter Song he wasn’t sure he would remember the words and actually told some girls to keep singing it because he was reading their lips to remember the words!
Based off the few new songs he did, I am very much so looking forward to getting the new album to hear it all for myself. It’s been quite some time since he last released a cd! He said he liked the idea of releasing CDs every 5 years because it showed a different side of him – but his first CD had songs he wrote literally while he was in high school and now he is 28 – so it’s actually been 10 years and that he wouldn’t do again.
For the last song – his latest single – Prince of Nothing Charming – he stood in the middle of the crowd and sang loud without his mic. It was really neat (aside from the fact that the kid next to me was talking THE. WHOLE. SHOW. and didn’t bother to shut up at this point either – even though Tyler politely asked for everyone to try and be quiet since he had no mic)
I opted to head home instead of hanging around to meet Tyler – it seemed like everyone wanted to hang out and he said they had to leave sooner than they thought so I figured that was a good time to make my escape. But it was certainly the best $10 ticket I’ve bought in a long time! (I only wish it was at a seated venue.)