Third Eye Blind conjures memories of high school, British raves in gig at Barnhill Arena | Band Notes

By Jeff Sistrunk
Ozarks Unbound

FAYETTEVILLE — Any haters who initially dismissed Third Eye Blind as washed-up ’90s relics when news of the band’s headlining performance at Barnhill Arena surfaced needed only to be at the show.

It took mere minutes to see that Stephan Jenkins and company are alive and well.

Sure, many of the several thousand people in attendance may have come out of a hunger for nostalgia, but nonetheless, Third Eye Blind delivered both old and new material with passion.

One of the most popular modern rock bands of the late ’90s and early 2000s, Third Eye Blind swept the airwaves with top 10 hits like “Semi-Charmed Life,” “Never Let You Go,” “How It’s Going to Be,” and, of course, the ubiquitous “Jumper.”

The band has sold 8 million albums to date and opened for U2 during its PopMart Tour in 1997, while lead singer Jenkins has regularly made the tabloids by dating starlet Charlize Theron and singer/songwriter Vanessa Carlton.

Some of the band’s biggest hits fittingly wound up in milestone teen movies like “Can’t Hardly Wait” and “American Pie.” However, after the success of its first two albums, “Third Eye Blind” (1997) and “Blue” (1999), Third Eye Blind’s appeal and popularity waned, and the band was unceremoniously dropped from Warner Music during a massive reconsolidation in 2004.

Still, Third Eye Blind’s long-awaited fourth album, “Ursa Major,” debuted on the charts at No.3 this year, albeit with less than 50,000 copies sold, and the trio (bolstered by a couple of touring musicians) has sold out venues across the U.S. on its comeback tour.

So, after travelling 16 hours from my old stomping ground of Anaheim, Calif., to be at the University of Arkansas for the November 17 gig, Third Eye Blind opened up the final night of its nonstop seven-week tour at about 9 p.m following an energetic set from Nashville-bred funk band Spacey Capone.

At first, it seemed as though the huge crowd may have literally rewound back in time to a warehouse rave in 1999 headlined by Crystal Method or the Prodigy.

The show opened not with strains of melodic modern rock, but a hard-hitting techno loop. Drummer Brad Hargreaves manned his drum kit (which was outfitted with twinkling lights) in the near-darkness and started playing along, then a female dancer appeared swathed in green and red glow sticks and gyrated around.

After tossing out all the glow sticks to members of the crowd, the dancer took her position behind a keyboard bank and, with the rest of the band now in place, the lights went up and Third Eye Blind erupted into the new song “Can You Take Me.”

Jenkins beckoned to the audience to “start a riot,” and, while it didn’t quite dissolve into anarchy, it was definitely fired up.

The nostalgia trip kicked in immediately thereafter with the featherweight “Losing a Whole Year,” from Third Eye Blind’s eponymous debut. The crowd enthusiastically chanted the titular refrain.

Following the sole cut from the band’s 2003 effort, “Out of the Vein” (the song “Faster”), Third Eye Blind unveiled one of the most impressive of its new tunes, a gorgeous keyboard-driven ballad called “Sharp Knife.” Then, the barefoot, fedora-clad Jenkins strummed the opening chords of “Never Let You Go,” and again pushed the crowd close to a near-frenzy.

Jenkins, who is 45 (!) didn’t show the first sign of age in serving as ringleader of Third Eye Blind’s five-man circus, which also includes lead guitarist Tony Fredianelli, touring bassist Abe Millet, and touring keyboardist/guitarist/dancer Lee Moretti.

He conducted himself as if he was still a college senior and elicited cheers with some of his stage banter (“I’m telling you the honest truth, I don’t want this to end…this is the last night of the tour, and that makes me feel f***ing crazy!”).

The remainder of the new material was hit or miss – “Dao of St. Paul” was awesome, with its hymn-like “Evermore, rejoice!” refrain; “Water Landing” was OK; and the band’s new single, the bland, ska-tinged “Don’t Believe a Word,” was horrendous.

“Monotov’s Private Opera,” a weird, dancey song that closed the band’s main set, echoed the earlier techno vibes.

As expected, the show’s highlights came during the band’s two biggest hits, “Jumper,” and “Semi-Charmed Life.”

The former was nearly transcendent- at one point, Jenkins turned the microphone towards the crowd and led them in an a capella rendition of the bridge melody.

During “Semi-Charmed Life,” it seemed as though the entire arena had transformed into a high school gymnasium at prom- hardly anyone could resist singing along.

“The spirit for our last album and our confidence come from you guys,” Jenkins said before the penultimate tune. “Instead of forgetting about us, you reminded us who we are. Thank you for keeping us in your hearts.”

And, as Third Eye Blind made the last-second addition of “God of Wine” to close the set, hundreds of smiling faces confirmed Jenkins’ words.

Setlist

“Can You Take Me”

“Losing a Whole Year”

“Faster”

“Wounded”

“Sharp Knife”

“Never Let You Go”

“Bonfire”

“Motorcycle Drive By”

“Water Landing”

“Jumper”

“Dao of St. Paul”

“Graduate”

“Monotov’s Private Opera”

Encore

“Slow Motion”

“Don’t Believe a Word”

“Semi-Charmed Life”

“God of Wine”

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