This too shall pass, all good thing must come to an end, and other such clichés.

I say this because Rich Aucoin is now on the last tour of his legendary parachute show. A few years ago, Rich announced he would be winding down this version of his live show, now its finally happening. And anyone who’s seen a Rich Aucoin post on this blog before will know how fun they are, so of course there was no way I was going to miss it.

With no opening act, the night started with Rich announcing the plan; first a Synthetic Set, comprised of songs off his latest series of albums of the same name, followed by an intermission, and then the Classic Set.

So it began with Rich behind his synth, trippy patterns flashing on screen behind him, as he started off with “Release”, and then wound through tracks from his Synthetic albums. The instrumentals zipped from dizzying highs to glitchy breakdowns, Rich rarely breaking between songs as they lead seamlessly into each other, whipping the crowd into a dancing storm.

During the break, a photo montage filled the screen, reminiscing of the last decade-plus of shows, accompanied by songs like “Good Riddance”, before a ten minute countdown hit to hype everyone up.

As the timer ticked down to zero, the show began with the usual “trailers”, a series of fun clips, memes, viral videos, and old school Canadiana (House Hippo, anyone?) before the audience summoned the narrator — David Attenborough this year, although past narrators Arnold Schwarzenegger and Michael Caine made cameos. With all that excitement building, it was time for the Feature Presentation, as the opening credits hit, shouting out people in the room with fun facts attached, staring off with Rich telling us we need a “New Nostalgia”.

From there, Rich — joined by phenomenal drummer Tony Dallas — blasted through a set of his high energy, incredibly fun, and often thought provoking tunes, spanning his entire career, from “At War With the Cynics (An Opening)” to “Kayfabe” and everything in-between. He squeezed in as many songs as possible, even doing mashups and medleys, pairing songs with thematic similarities, like “How it Breaks” & “Watching, Wishing, Waiting” or “Four More Years” & “Want to Believe”. Throughout the whole show, the crowd sang with no reservations, as he conducted everyone to shout along with “Undead” and “Brian Wilson is A.L.i.V.E.”, the big screen almost always including lyrics.

Along with those lyrics, the screen behind Rich also featured a selection of visuals, from static images to his music videos, to thematically appropriate clips. He even harkened back to some of his early shows while showing parts of How the Grinch Stole Christmas syncing up to songs like “10,342 Cuts for the US (An Exploding)” from his Personal Publication EP, written to sync up with the animated classic.

As usual, Rich was teeming with energy. When not behind the synth he was bounding across the stage, and often into the crowd to sing with everyone (it’s no wonder he’s retiring the show, I was exhausted just watching!) And the crowd was very much reciprocating that energy, no more evident than during “Are You Experiencing?” as the parachute came out for everyone to dance under, while screaming along “When you give it all up, you get it back”.

The set came to a close with perennial (and personal) favourite “It” but Rich had one last surprise, leaving everyone with a singalong to another fun mashup. But this time not any of his own songs; the tune of “Stand by Me”, accompanied by the lyrics to “All Star”.

And so the set came to a close, with Rich in the middle of the crowd, promising that even though this era is coming to an end, he would definitely be back in a new form, be it his synth show or a brand new experience.

And I can’t wait to see whatever it is.