Concert Review: Phantogram @ The Fillmore Silver Spring (2/4/25)

“What the fuck is up, DC?” – Sarah Barthel

A lot is up, that’s for sure, but let’s focus on music! Midway through their Running Through Colors Tour, Phantogram performed at The Fillmore Silver Spring on February 4, 2025 to a near capacity, brimming with energy multitude of like-minded people. In that we all love music, and Phantogram specifically. This was the fourth time I’ve witnessed them live, the second as a headliner. What did we all learn from this Phantogram concert?

We learned that their fifth studio album, Memory of a Day (via Neon Gold Records), is more than worthy of your time. If you haven’t bought it yet (or streamed it), this is the time for you to correct that gap in your life. They performed 18 songs in total, including seven from Memory of a Day.

We learned Sarah Barthel (vocals, keyboard, guitar, more) and Josh Carter’s (guitar, vocals, more) favorite songs from the new album, “It Wasn’t Meant to Be” and “Attaway” respectively. I learned my favorite song from the album (without their same depth of knowledge, of course) is “Happy Again”.

We learned that their mix of electronic, sometimes psychedelic, rock/pop is a balm to cure what is ailing you. If you walked away from the show without so much as a single rush of adrenaline, you may want to check for a pulse. If you didn’t attend, hopefully you still have a chance in another venue! The tour ends in LA on February 28th.

We learned the tour was aptly named, a consistent atmosphere of intense smoke (not weed) and vibrant colors amplified their polished stage presence perfectly. The colors put us in a receptive mood to join them wherever they wanted to take us. What a ride.

I learned that this was the best concert I’ve witnessed of theirs so far. They sounded great. Sarah’s voice resonated gracefully across the cavernous interior of The Fillmore, adding in stints at the keyboard and picking up the guitar a few times (while having a sip from her glass perched on a side-stage speaker). Josh was often a flurry of motion across the stage, bringing a stoic intensity to his guitar beats. He also sang lead here and there, sometimes they shared vocal duties in a given song.

The heart of Phantogram is Sarah and Josh, but included two additional musicians at The Fillmore, Jonathan Mooney (keyboard, guitar, violin, more) and one other (missed his name) on drums. Jonathan pulled multiple duties, like in the encore for “Glowing” he traded his keyboard for a healthy dose of violin, while Sarah stopped moving for a few heartbeats to play from her keyboard.

At 9:15pm a low rumbling started inside The Fillmore as each member of Phantogram entered the stage with the lights down. Once the lights burst forth, they kicked off our education with the atmospheric first track from Memory of a Day called “Jealousy”. It speaks to the white hot emotions and consequences of being jealous, while effectively centering you into their world of dreamy electronic rock. The best moment is when Sarah takes a high note in the lyric ‘I’ll take the high road, pound on the steering wheel and scream it should be me to all my enemies’.

Next was “Don’t Move” (from 2011’s Nightlift EP), where Sarah picked up her guitar and moved the microphone down a step of the multi-level stage, closer to her legion of music disciples. After the song, she succumbed to the heat of the moment and took her jacket off. Most people were still wearing jackets inside, but they weren’t expending that level of energy.

Phantogram is from New York state, and has so far released five studio albums since 2010, along with a number of EPs. They first formed in 2007 under the name Charlie Everywhere, before changing the name to Phantogram in 2009. The name refers to an optical illusion where two-dimensional images appear to be three-dimensional, and they believed that was an excellent parallel to their own music.

Of course they played a number of the hits they’ve grown famous for, the first being “Fall In Love” from 2014’s Voices. I’ve heard this song both live and recorded, but I gained a new appreciation based on this rendition. It was sublimely done, I definitely underrated this song about a women that uses her friend who is in love with her. Her actions cause catastrophic harm to him and she feels guilty.

They sampled from all of their five albums, performing two or three songs from each. Nearing the end of the main set, they played another new song “All a Mystery”, where Sarah, standing regally at her keyboard, was awash in the brilliant glow of white lights shining outward. Every stage light available was put to the test, and visually it was the coolest moment of the concert. The lyrics delve into surrendering to what life gives you in all its dimensions while questioning the why and how, and wondering how we can go from our current state or place to another we remember fondly.

Hearing “Happy Again” for the first time, I was struck by a sense of admiration. It speaks to waiting for the moment when the pain of a failed relationship can finally morph into something akin to happiness. The notion that it was my favorite song they performed from the new album manifested when Sarah sang the opening of the chorus, ‘Another year gone by’. I’ve already listened to it way too many times since the concert. Listening to it now. You can’t stop me.

We may find another lesson here, if you love something — go for it. Enjoy it for what it is and how it makes you feel. No judgements.

In order not to disappoint, they saved their super bangers for the end. “Black Out Days” was the penultimate song of the main set, then “You Don’t Get Me High Anymore” and “When I’m Small” closed out the encore. As a Phantogram fan, these hardly need introduction nor praise, but it’s worth noting that one could sense the literal chills of anticipation ripple across the crowd as the first notes of each song reached our ears.

“You Don’t Get Me High Anymore” is a song I’ve listened to a lot recently. I can’t get enough of the sinister beats in the opening and chorus, and the vocal trade-off between hip hop and whispering a dark secret about not being able to feel anymore. The sound is amazing, the message is devastating, and somehow this juxtaposition ominously won’t let me go.

To end our evening Josh introduced “When I’m Small” as the second song they ever wrote together, which speaks to the conflict of a women dealing with an abusive partner. The song’s true nature is a primal scream against oppression.

They danced and waved to the crowd as we exited under the rap beats of “Win” by Jay Rock. And if you listen to the lyrics you’re either with Phantogram and ready to win, or get out of the way.

That is what the fuck is up.

No more lessons, just actions. Use all your resources to buy a copy of Memory of a Day, and their whole catalog, then make sure you witness Phantogram live for yourself as soon as possible.

Setlist