Real Estate with up and coming opener Grumpy made their debut at Electric City to a packed venue on February 1 in iced over Buffalo. This was the second stop on Real Estate’s winter tour. The show reverted the audience to a nostalgic indie soundscape of the early 2010s, a seemingly simpler time.

The Saturday night show opened with the lead singer songwriter of Grumpy, Mason Schmidt (guitar) to an all ages crowd. Schmidt shared this is their first ‘real’ tour and sang their infectious tiktok style short songs and lyrics that celebrate their growth as a person and musician. Buffalo eagerly awaits the opportunity for Grumpy to return with their whole band.

New Jersey band, Real Estate, hasn’t visited Buffalo since 2021 at Asbury Hall (Babeville). Childhood friends, Martin Courtney (lead vocals, rhythm guitar) and Alex Bleeker (bass, backing vocals) and Julian Lynch (lead guitar) and Sammis Niss (drums) came out on stage with a Real Estate DVD logo bouncing around like a screensaver making us reminisce to when we bought physical albums and DVDs or left our giant desktops idle. The show showcased Alex Bleeker’s driving basslines and his musical connection to lifelong friend Courtney, layered guitar licks, rhythmic arrangement range between songs, and Niss’ steady drum beats. The set celebrated songs across all six of their albums with a brilliantly tailored setlist by Alex Bleeker.

Real Estate led the show with older favorites like ‘Easy’ and ‘Had to Hear’ and seamlessly returned to their new album, Daniel, with tracks like ‘Somebody New’ and ‘Flowers.’ The setlist drifted forward and back throughout their catalogue, satisfying new and older fans. Fans were surprised to hear songs like ‘Paper Cup’, a song accompanied by Sylvan Esso on their album The Main Thing and one of their opening encore songs, ‘Beachcomber’ from their debut album played in a harder style and arrangement.

Real Estate’s next show is on February 3, 2025 in Indianapolis with the support of Grumpy. If you missed their show in New York, you can catch them in Woodstock at Bearsville Theater on February 13

Setlist: Easy, Had to Hear, Somebody New, Flowers, Fake Blues, Paper Cup, Crime, Water Underground, Say No More, Green Aisles, Stained Glass, Darling, Freeze Brain, Air Drop, Talking Backwards, Interior, Haunted World, *Layla Tease*, It’s Real
Encore: Beachcomber, Municipality










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