Dry Cleaning at Kilby Block Party 2026 (spoilers)
My favorite set of KBP, was so stoked to see them and was wondering who else caught them. I also wanted to get people's thoughts on the intro and digital visuals.
Removed the spoiler tag because it sounds like they haven't done this intro (which is explained below) at other shows, but I'm not sure if they will do it again in the future. So, I guess don't read ahead if you don't want a spoiler for a future show, but also this may have been a one-time thing for Kilby; who knows.
A gentleman walked out before the band came on in a bright green Lucky Charms t-shirt, with a very eerie guitar loop playing in the background. On the screen behind him was a video loop of the band members on a Zoom call--which looked distorted and felt unsettling--under a caption that said something about an "experiment." The guy said he was from Detroit (which the crowd extolled), asked if we liked his Lucky Charms shirt (which got even more of a reaction), and then told us to take out our phones and follow Dry Cleaning on all social media (which I think was mostly met with groans from the crowd). Once he made the social media request, it became obvious to me that the whole intro was a bit (and a really unsettling one at that). It's not like I could have followed them anyway, as I don't have social media (other than this, I guess) so I did nothing. Then the band came out, and was smiling and laughing with the guy who had just introduced them as he walked backstage. Then the guitar loop continued right into 'Sliced by a Fingernail,' and the visual on screen changed to a chopped up and looped video of Florence cutting up and snorting a substance off of a table. It was hard to tell if she was actually snorting up something like coke at all, as they didn't actually show the thing she was "snorting." It all felt extremely surreal and off-putting, and was clearly meant to be a commentary on social media. The rest of the visuals after this song appeared to be iphone footage of random things on a loop, like slowed-down footage of a guy driving a forklift off screen.
They had so much energy live and the band was incredibly tight, some mind blowing guitar riffs/solos and drum fills. Plus Florence's vocals sounded great, which I wasn't sure how they were going to pull off going into the set.
Anyone else find the intro/set to be incredibly eerie but beautiful? I'm wondering if they have been doing that intro at their other shows. We had an extremely pleasant and gentle but energetic mosh up front with the people around us.
My other fav performances included YHWH Nailgun, american football, Gelli Haha, Alex G, Chanel Beads, but all the bands were amazing and highly anticipated!