Pale Lungs and Friends Rock On at The End

Thursday night, local indie-rock notables Pale Lungs’ tour with Toronto it-band PONY kicked off at The End. The co-headliners proved to be a formidable one-two punch, but two more Nashville acts came first, confirming that a crucial corner of the local rock scene has a clean bill of health.

Industrial dream-pop outfit Pressure Heaven opened the evening. (Sadly, the night didn’t go as planned for our photog, and he arrived after their set was over. Cue the sad trombones.) The group’s online presence gives the impression that it’s a guitar-and-vocals duo. This checked out visually because the band’s fog machine almost completely obscured the drums onstage. Surely, that kit was only there for backlining purposes — no need to brace yourself for a jump scare, right? But upon the first song hitting its stride, a still-invisible drummer brought even more brutality and musical precision to “Spiral” and other selections from the growing Pressure Heaven catalog. 

The best visual was what you didn’t see, and it added an element of surprise and intrigue to one of the most imaginative local acts that might not be on your radar. It wouldn’t be a surprise to see Pressure Heaven develop a devoted and still-growing following like that of Total Wife, fellow locals with more mileage under their belt. After Pressure Heaven set the bar incredibly high, solo act Bogues served a change of pace. On songs from his 2023 EP I Know You’re Getting Older, he offered up storytelling that relied as much on his multiple guitars — three for six songs, per his witty stage banter — and effects pedals as it did his poetic reflections on growing up.

Once the two pillars of PONY — singer Sam Bielanski and guitarist Matty Morand — and their rhythm section started holding court, one notion about the quartet’s engaging, active stage presence and its ’90s-tinged power-pop gems like “Très Jolie” became unshakable. Visually and sonically, they are the kind of band you for sure would’ve heard and maybe even seen on a TV drama targeting a younger audience in the ’90s or early Aughts. Think Beverly Hills, 90210 or, better yet, Dawson’s Creek. Fittingly, after-the-fact perusing of press materials revealed that a PONY song made it onto an episode of Canadian national treasure Degrassi. 

Pale Lungs launched its tour in a venue that’s very familiar to the group and its fans. Indeed, the release show for the band’s 2023 self-titled album took place at The End one year and three days prior. Most coverage of Pale Lungs over the past year or so has put over how the shoegaze- and emo-flavored group now focuses as much on telling stories through words as it does on concocting musical blends of guitar-rock reference points. That proved true throughout a set that captivated a considerably packed house for a weeknight. Creative touches like the steel-guitar sound that's not an actual steel guitar on the elegiac “Burning Time” — at least, it wasn’t played on steel guitar on Thursday — sounded as well-executed onstage as they do on the album.

It made sense to stick with DIY tradition and have the top-drawing local act go on last, but with all due respect to Pale Lungs, few bands between here and Toronto could’ve topped that PONY set. While the out-of-towners shone brightest, the rest of the bill cast a positive light on indie rock in Music City, bubbling across an assortment of scenes well-stocked with both established acts and those on the rise.