Doug Hoyer and Christian Hansen brought the pop to the Slice, April 16. While I am not a huge fan of this new wave of ’80s pop influenced music, Edmontononians Doug Hoyer and Christian Hansen do it really well as they showed a decent sized Wednesday night crowd of approximately 30.
While I missed an opening set from Mark Mills, I caught and excellent set of catchy guitar powered pop by Doug Hoyer and his band, which included Jesse Northey adding extra keyboards and excellent background vocals.
Doug Hoyer and his band provided a solid beat to dance to, though nobody was and sang appealing melodies reminiscent of ’80s pop bands like the Pet Shop Boys.
He also played catchy guitar hooks.
Christian Hansen took pop to a whole other level with an amazingly tight set with his band.
He had impressive stage presence and superb singing and when he picked up the guitar, he reminded me of a young Billy Idol for some of the more punk influenced pop songs.
“ High School’s Over” from an earlier album was a highlight as was several catchy numbers from his most recent CD “C’mon Arizona.”
His hipster song was a highlight as was “Hurry Up and Die.”
He advised the audience to ABC or “Always Be Dancing” though few took him up on it.