Familiar faces, The Aces Return to New York for their I’ve Loved You For So Long Tour.
Shot and written by Shauna Hilferty
October 11, 2023
New York, NY @ Brooklyn Steel
“We’re from a small town in Utah,” lead singer Cristal Ramirez says to the Brooklyn crowd. “But we consider Brooklyn – New York – our second home. This is like a homecoming for us.”
The four-piece indie-rock group The Aces, return to the Brooklyn Steel stage on a Wednesday night. After the release of their third studio album, I’ve Loved You For So Long, it feels refreshing to see the girls – sisters Cristal and Alisa Ramirez and long-time friends Katie Henderson, and McKenna Petty – take the checkered stage, adorned in button-ups and neckties and their signature and effortless coolness.
They begin with their third song off the album, “I Always Get This Way.” The lights pulse as each member walks in from the left side stage, unrecognizable silhouettes strapping guitars and grabbing microphone wires. The lights turn up as the snare drum keeps time and Cristal’s voice rings through the speakers. Phones already recording since the first light flicker are held up in the air, along with wristband-clad hands of fans waving, singing, and dancing to the undeniably catchy beat.
Shauna Hilferty
Both bassist, Katie Henderson and drummer Alisa Ramirez get their solos towards the beginning of the set, Alisa even tossing the stick up in the air and catching it without missing a beat. As an ode to OG fans, two tracks from their sophomore album Under My Influence are played back to back. A dreamy transition fades into “Not The Same,” and the crowd sways along. In between songs, Cristial is gracious, thanking the crowd for knowing the words, for supporting the dream of the band. She tells the audience before “Stop Feeling,” that she wrote the song at a dark place in her life, where “[she] would have panic attacks almost every night…and the one thing – the one light at the end of the tunnel was this band.”
The title track, “I’ve Loved You For So Long” plays, and as suspected, the lyric “Wearing your hair up in your New York apartment” is the loudest the crowd sings any lyric the entire show. The entire song feels like a montage on film and hits different especially in New York.
The Aces’ honesty is something that draws the listener in. And their message in between the lines is what keeps them listening. New and old fans resonate with the lyrics, and the songs are sonically fun to dance and sing along to. It’s uncut, unedited and emotionally evocative. With The Aces, what you see is what you get and what you see is a band changing the landscape of pop music – one song at a time.
