The Minnesota then-quartet (they are now a five piece!) introduced me to an idea that at the time seemed so foreign to me: good music wasn’t necessarily the one playing on the radio. Crazy, I know! You could find it in all corners of the internet; on Youtube videos with less than 10k views, Tumblr playlists made by a 14-year-old on the other side of the world, recommendations made by a fellow Directioner you followed on Twitter in 2011. You just needed to actually search for new artists and new sounds. Songs like “Violet,” “Suicide Saturday,” and “Sophie So” became the blueprint for my music taste, and to this day Hippo Campus remain the band that I picture when I think of what “indie” means.

The same way Hippo Campus left a mark on me then, it did again in 2018, when I rented a car and drove through Los Angeles for the first time to go see them in Santa Ana, and then once more in 2022, when they became the second band I ever took photos of (by sneaking my camera into a venue before I even knew how photo passes worked, that is). Their photographer Brit O’Brien was also the first concert photographer I ever followed on Instagram and remains one of my biggest inspirations to this day. 

It’s funny to think about the phases of my life I was in each time, and how the band’s music has remained a constant presence. About a decade later after the “Violet” music video showed up on my Recommended tab, I now had the opportunity to properly document one of their shows, and I can confirm that the magic I felt in their music as a teenager is still very much there.

Delivering a different set of songs every single night, Hippo Campus’ show at HISTORY began with a couple of songs from Flood, the band’s newest record that prompted this tour. “Tooth Fairy” and “Paranoid” were followed by “Ride or Die,” a single from their previous album LP3. These three songs set the tone nicely for a night full of joy and lightheartedness, for a venue filled with people that either did not care for the Super Bowl or loved Hippo Campus enough to miss it. One of my favorite songs to ever exist, “Baseball,” came next, immediately showing why it remains on the setlist to this day as the entire audience sang and danced. One of the highlights of the night came a little later though, when the band performed “Buttercup,” the sole song on the setlist from their debut album Landmark (an album cover that I put into a t-shirt nine years ago and still wear to this day).

Although the set naturally consisted of mostly new songs from the album they’re promoting, it still left enough space for their previous work to shine. Multiple songs from their 2018 LP Bambi made the cut, and the band’s lead guitarist Nathan Stocker got to be the main character of the night for a bit as they played “No Poms” from its companion, the Demos II project.

At one point nearing the end of the night, Jake Luppen, the band’s frontman and lead singer introduced the song “Suicide Saturday,” one of my favorites from their discography, and then laughed and proceeded to play a different song, triggering a very strong one-sided beef with me.

They closed the show with the mystical “Boys,” one of their most popular recent releases that managed to bring the energy from the audience to a new high, and then came back to perform “South” as the encore, which I was personally thankful for. Some songs that were performed in other cities that I wish had made it into this list were “Bad Dream Baby” (literally a banger), “Warm Glow” (this hurts my soul), “Way It Goes” (but this one is probably the one that hurts the most), “Honestly” (actually no one has gotten this one yet), “Violet” (do I even need to say anything???), and “Suicide Saturday” (Jake Luppen you will pay for your crimes). If you get to witness one of these soon, just know that *insert meme that reads ‘I don’t really care if something good happened to you, it should’ve happened to me instead’*.

Jokes aside, the Hippo Campus boys have opened up in the past about the struggle to try to grow and evolve as artists while keeping your following happy. Fan bases tend to hold on to the past, pushing “older and better” songs, but I think Hippo Campus have managed to create a show that can leave both them and their audience content. With an ever-changing setlist, there are treats that come in the form of older songs being played in the middle of the show, and there are others in the shape of newer music that can still evoke the same feeling you got when you first found them.

There is something so particular about this Midwest band and the atmosphere they are able to create solely through their music, and getting to experience it live is one of the most wonderful things that they can offer us. They’ve been doing this for a decade now, and you can see it in their confidence and the easygoing dynamic they maintain onstage. As this was one of the earliest stops on this tour run, I’m sure the shows will only get better. And especially since concert season is just picking up again, I have a feeling anyone who gets to see them playing will be able to find something inspiring and refreshing, and something to keep them going for at least a little while (which I know some of us sometimes need!).