Staff Editor on August 12th, 2019

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Young the Giant and Fitz & the Tantrums — two bands who cut their teeth in the Southern California scene — turned Saturday night at the Forum into a pop spectacle, each playing hit-laden sets with material that dated back to 2010, the year each released its debut album.

After Nashville’s Coin set the tone with an energetic early set, Fitz & the Tantrums greeted a giddy crowd ready to dance. And by the time they performed one of their biggest singles, “Out of My League,” as their fourth song, the Forum floor was vibrating from the crowd jumping up and down. Singers Michael Fitzpatrick and Noelle Scaggs danced and played off each other frantically — Scaggs, wearing a Pride jacket, told the crowd, “This is a safe place, let’s keep the party going!” And they did, for an hour, putting an exclamation point on their set by finishing with the ubiquitous dance-pop track “HandClap,” the latest single “All the Feels” and 2013’s “The Walker.”

Young the Giant picked up where the Tantrums left off. They were all business for the first couple of songs, effortlessly transitioning from one song to the next. Then singer Sameer Gadhia told the crowd: “This is a hometown show for us. We haven’t been back in three years and it’s great to be back at the Forum. We are used to playing the Roxy and Whisky A Go Go, and it is great to be welcomed back.”

In introducing “Firelight,” Gadhia said, “This next song is about all the weigh we can carry and the shit that brings us down but then can also lift us above the stars.” It felt like Saturday’s show did the latter.

Fitz & The Tantrums setlist: Get Right Back, Spark, Don’t Gotta Work Out, Out of My League, 123456, Break the Walls, MoneyGrabber, Fool, OCD, Fools Gold, I Need Help!, Roll Up, Burn it Down, I Just Wanna Shine, Hands Up, HandClap, All the Feels, The Walker

Young The Giant setlist: Oblivion, something to believe in, Heat of Summer, Apartment, Amerika, Nothing’s Over, Home of the Strange, Titus Was Born, Firelight, Cough Syrup, Panaromic Girl, Mind Over Matter, Call Me Back. Encore: Superstition, Tightrope, Silvertongue, My Body

Photos by Jessica Hanley