Pen & Page

A family emergency has caused Thrice to cancel its stop in Billings on Thursday. The band canceled the remaining tour dates with Manchester Orchestra and O’Brother, and there is no word on Thrice rescheduling the date.

According to the Thrice website: “The remaining dates on our co-headline tour with Manchester Orchestra (& O’Brother) have been cancelled. Ticket refunds will be made available at point of purchase. We are very very sorry to have to do this, but please trust that we would not be taking this sort of action unless dire circumstances were involved.”

Thrice Lead singer and guitarist Dustin Kensrue updated fans as to the issues involved in Thrice canceling the tour. His father has an aggressive brain tumor, and Kensrue made the decision to be with family.

“I want to thank everyone for their understanding and support and prayers. I spent last night and today with my family and am very glad I made the decision to leave as quickly as I did. Life is precious and fleeting, and events like these make real the fact that every moment is a gift, not a right. I thank God for the gift of my father, for the ways he has loved me and the things he has taught me thus far, and for the ways he will continue to love me and teach me in the time that God gives us.“

California-based quartet Thrice co-headline a tour with Manchester Orchestra, coming to Billings April 29 (photo by Dustin Rabin)

In an imposing paring, two distinctly different powerhouses of indie rock have come together for a co-headline tour: California post-hardcore band Thrice and Atlanta, Georgia indie rock five-piece Manchester Orchestra.

Billings slips into the last leg of the tour and hosts one of 18 concerts the bands will co-headline. The show will take place April 29 at the Railyard Alehouse.

A band of prodigious talent, Thrice has been evolving its sound since forming in the late 90s in Irvine California.

The band’s second album, Illusion of Safety, debuted on Sub City, and the releases that followed featured increased instrumentation and experimentation, leading to the band’s ambitious Alchemy Index, two releases comprised of four EPs produced in 2007 and 2008.

Each album of the four-volume collection was devoted to one of the classical elements in nature—fire, water, earth and air. Vagrant, the record label that Thrice landed during this time, called each EP “sonically and thematically tailored to evoke the atmosphere inherent in its corresponding element.”

Thrice is touring on Beggars, the band’s December 2009 release that followed the Alchemy Index Vol. III – Air and Vol. IV – Earth.

Manchester Orchestra, fronted by Andy Hull.

An equally impressive band, Manchestra Orchestra is the indie rock manifesto of Andy Hull.

Hull is the gruff and guttural frontman for Manchester Orchestra. Sharply affluent, Hull delivers the band’s sundry setlist with biting honesty. “The blood was dry, it was sober / The feeling of audible cracks / And I could tell it was over / From the curtains that hung from your neck / And I realized that then you were perfect,” Hull sings in “I Can Feel a Hot One” from the band’s 2008 release Mean Everything To Nothing.

Hull’s creativity soars outside Manchester Orchestra to his solo side project Right Away, Great Captain!, where Hull details the saga of a 17th century sailor who catches his wife in an act of betrayal with his brother.

Tickets ($20 in advance plus fees) go on sale February 25 at 1 p.m. and are available at Ernie November, Rimrock Mall, by phone at 1-800-514-ETIX or online at 1111presents.com.

For full spring tour dates, visit www.thrice.net or www.themanchesterorchestra.com.