HINDER

January 13, 2016
Toads Place
New Haven, CT

May of 2015 Hinder released their latest album, “When The Smoke Clears” and on Wednesday night they stopped in at Toad’s Place to play a few tunes and they brought a few friends with them. Supporting them on this tour is a band from Baltimore called Revolve, Alabama’s Within Reason and from Missouri, Shaman’s Harvest. I have to say this is one of the few times I have actually liked all the bands that were opening, all them sounded great.

The lights went down and the noise from the crowd went up as Joe ‘Blower’ Garvey and Mark King on guitars, Mike Rodden on bass and the drummer Cody Hanson took to the stage and started into “Use Me” with the added guitar of vocalist Marshal Dutton bouncing across the stage.

The energy given off by Marshal as he danced around the stage was contagious as the audience sang along to every word of “Homecoming Queen” and “What Ya Gonna Do” they continued on singing along and cell phones came up recording every second as they started into “Up All Night”.

It was amazing to watch this band and the crowd singing and reaching out to Marshal when he was at the front of the stage, slapping and shaking hands every time, even grabbing a phone and recording from the stage. The set contained a lot of their popular songs such as,“Hit the Ground” “Sides of Me” “How Long” “Intoxicated” and one of my personal favorites of the evening a cover of The Stone Temple Pilots “Wicked Garden” and then “Wasted Life” which left me wondering, if that was done on purpose or just coincidence, then finishing the set off with “See You In Hell”

After a few moments of the crowd screaming, they came back out for the encore, everyone’s favorite sing along of the night “Lips of an Angel”. I think I was even guilty of recording this one and the evening then ended with one of my favorite songs, “Get Stoned”

Hinder has been around since 2001 and like every other band out there has gone thru lineup changes, most significantly their lead singer, Marshal Dutton, who came aboard permanently in Jan 2015 and definitely has brought a charisma that I feel was not there with the original singer, who I had seen on tour with them years ago. His energy and connection with the audience made the show enjoyable, along with the a band that on a cold January night in New Haven actually looked like they were having a good time.