Dear Rouge, April 6, 2018
On April 6, 2018, Elements Nightclub in Kitchener hosted a stacked bill on Lights’ We Were Here tour, with Vancouver duo Dear Rouge stepping in as direct support. The date landed less than a month after the release of their sophomore album PHASES (out March 9, 2018), so the band hit the stage with that “new record energy” still crackling in the air.
Elements, a standing-room rock club, was a perfect match for Dear Rouge’s blend of guitar-heavy alt-rock and glossy synth hooks. It was great to be crouched in a photo pit once again.
As the lights dropped and the first pulsing synths kicked in, Danielle McTaggart immediately claimed the room, pacing the edge of the stage, leaning into the crowd, and turning a support slot into something that felt very close to a co-headline moment.
Across their set, Dear Rouge pulled mostly from Black To Gold and the freshly minted PHASES material. You could hear the band’s evolution in real time: older tracks with big, anthemic choruses sat comfortably next to the sleeker, more emotionally charged new songs. Reviews of the band from that era regularly talk about them as high-energy performers with a live sound that’s heavy on guitars and drums but anchored by a strong pop sensibility, and that’s exactly how this night felt intense but accessible, indie-rock grit wrapped around radio-ready melodies.
What really stood out was the physicality of the performance. Danielle’s constant movement, hair-flips, crawling on the floor of the stage and willingness to sing directly to individual faces in the crowd turned the club into a shared space rather than a gap between stage and floor an impression echoed in other tour-stop write-ups where she’s described grabbing the mic stand, jumping, and feeding off the audience’s energy. Drew McTaggart’s guitar work and backing vocals thickened the sound, while the rhythm section kept everything driving forward; there were few pauses, and the set felt like a single arc of tension and release designed to hand a warmed-up, roaring room over to Lights.
By the time Dear Rouge wrapped, Elements felt transformed from exactly what you want from an opener: a band that doesn’t just pass time but actively raises the stakes for what comes next.
