The Year in Music: The Year in Live Shows

Exactly one year ago, I posted about the year in live shows, 2010. Following the same format, here's the rundown on 2011, keeping in mind that I still have tickets for two upcoming shows: the War on Drugs @ Lincoln Hall (12/7), and Joy Formidable @ the Metro (12/15).

•  Shows attended: 54 (plus two remaining), which means I'll beat last year by about 10. 
•  Sets witnessed: 97 (plus about four remaining). Again, besting last year by about 10.

Shows by venue:

• Lincoln Hall - 20
• Schuba's - 12
• Empty Bottle - 5
• the Metro - 3
• The Vic - 2
• Subterranean - 2
• the Bottom Lounge - 2
• the Double Door - 2
• The Hideout - 1
• Beat Kitchen - 1
• Fireside Bowl - 1
• Silverlake Lounge - 1
• Plus a number of Festival shows

Bands Seen Multiple Times (including festival shows):

• tUnE-yArDs - 4
• the 1900s - 3
• the War on Drugs - 3
• Smith Westerns - 3
• Besnard Lakes - 2
• Cults - 2
• Destroyer - 2
• Eleanor Friedberger - 2
• the Fiery Furnaces - 2
• Handsome Furs - 2
• Joy Formidable - 2
• Peter Bjorn and John - 2
• Team Band - 2
• Ted Leo - 2 (once solo, once with the Pharmacists)
• the Thermals - 2
• Wild Flag - 2
• YAWN - 2

Biggest Months: 

• July - 9
• May - 7
• October - 7
• June - 6
• August - 6

This year seemed more evenly spread out than last year.  

Biggest Letdowns:

Can't say I really had too many letdowns this year.  Most of the shows I went to provided a pretty good value, and I can't say there was anyone I was really psyched to see who didn't deliver.  I suppose I was not well positioned for either St. Vincent or Lykke Li, but that's really my own fault.  I was a bit let down by Pitchfork's overall lineup, particularly Saturday, a day on which Destroyer was the only band I really wanted to see.  I was also a bit let down by the fact that PJ Harvey didn't play any Chicago dates.

Biggest Surprise of the Year:

Actually, this year's biggest surprise was a band who was one of last year's biggest letdowns.  Girls gave what I thought was a pretty awful performance at the Pitchfork Festival, but they redeemed themselves this year with a really phenomenal show at Lincoln Hall.  I'd imagine the venue played no small role in that, but beyond the hot sun last year, I just thought their set and the tempo at which it was played didn't translate well to a live show.  No such problems this year.  I was also somewhat surprised by how much I really enjoyed the two Peter, Bjorn, & John shows I attended, particularly because those shows weren't on my radar until I learned that the 1900s would be opening one of them.  the 1900s are the reason I bought a ticket, and I ended up really being glad that I got a chance to see PB&J.

Best Single Night of Music:

Sunday at the Pitchfork Festival probably had the best overall lineup of music that I saw this year, starting off with Superchunk, leading into Deerhunter, followed by Cut Copy, and closed out with TV on the Radio.  Deerhunter put on the best performance of the weekend, and Cut Copy was better than I expected.  It was a nice way to end the Festival after a solid Friday (tUnE-yArDs, Guided by Voices, Animal Collective), and a crappy Saturday.

Biggest Screw-Job of the Year:

On June 15th at the Double Door, Team Band got totally hosed by Art Brut, a band they had been friendly with in the past.  The show was supposed to start at 9:00, with Team Band as the first opener.  Art Brut made them go on at 8:30.  Fortunately, I had checked the venue's website, which had been updated, but all of the information for the show had originally listed the start time as 9:00.  Other people who actually wanted to see Team Band, a really fun local act (and by local, I mean like my neighborhood) weren't so lucky.  The surprising thing about this is that the two bands have played together quite a few times, and the guys in Art Brut were kinda dicks about the whole thing, which really makes me want to not like Art Brut.  Fortunately, their album this year kind of sucked, so the situation kind of took care of itself.  

Top Five Shows of the Year:  

This was kind of a weird year in that there were a lot of really good shows, but very few, if any, really stood out and blew me away like the Fiery Furnaces, Titus Andronicus, and Deerhunter last year.  That said, these are the five that made the largest impression.

5) Gruff Rhys@ Schuba's - June 9th: It's been a couple years since Gruff Rhys has been to town with his main act, the Super Furry Animals, but he's been to town twice in the last few years promoting his solo stuff.  A couple years ago, he brought an extra vocalist, a bunch of props, and that was pretty much it.  He created a swirl of loops and percussion to fill in for the lack of backing musicians, and it nicely complemented his album Candylion.  This time, the Welsh surf rock band Y Niwl acted as both Gruff's opening band, and his back-up band.  The set up was well suited for his most recent album Hotel Shampoo, which is a bit more pop/rock forward than Candylion was.  His self deprecation played well to the smallish crowd in an intimate setting (Schuba's holds fewer than 200 people even when sold out).  It was among the best shows I've seen him do, with or without SFA. 

4) Wild Flag @ the Empty Bottle - October 9th: These ladies come to rock.  With Janet Weiss pounding away on drums while lead guitar duties switched back and forth between Mary Timony and Carrie Brownstein, they brought a lot of energy to the packed crowd at the Empty Bottle.  

3) tUnE-yArDs @ Lincoln Hall - May 10th: The first of the three shows she played at Lincoln Hall this year, I actually made it over the venue in plenty of time after having seen the Fiery Furnaces play their "recital show" at Schuba's earlier in the evening.  

2) the Thermals @ the Green Music Festival - June 26th: It's almost impossible for the Thermals to put together a set list that won't translate well to a live show.  They tried at the Onion AV Fest show in September, but even that show turned out pretty good.  At the Green Music Festival in Wicker Park, they were as close to perfect as possible.  They broke out all of their best stuff from across their entire catalog, and they hit every note.  They're also a band who clearly has a good time playing live.  Drummer Westin Glass may be the most enthusiastic musician I've ever seen.  It was also the only show I've ever seen with a stage set up right in front of a retirement home, and they even had those residents interested.

1) Ted Leo and the Pharmacist @ the Fireside Bowl - July 26th:  TL/Rx can sell out a venue like the Metro that holds over a thousand people.  So if you have the opportunity to see them in front of about a hundred people at an old bowling alley, you have to take advantage.  No big speaker system, no fancy light show.  Just a couple of big PA speakers and a punk band playing the kind of stuff they played back when bowling alley style gigs were all they could get.  The sound wasn't terrific, but the set was long and the setting was perfect.

Eleanor Friedberger @ the Hideout - 7/20/11

Fresh off a late Spring tour with her brother, the Fiery Furnaces as a duo, Eleanor Friedberger released her first true solo album, "Last Summer", and has hit the road in support. She called the duo tour their "recital", and it really had that type of feel. Just her brother Matt at the keys and Eleanor on vocals as they re-interpreted a selection of music covering more or less their entire catalog.

Last night she hit the stage without the security of a fellow performer and played an interesting mix of album tracks, Fiery Furnaces classics, new tracks that aren't on the album, and even a cover of a Spoon song, which she introduced as a song written by "the guy that licks my face" in the video for her first single "My Mistakes" (below).

The venue was packed and fairly hot, and as a Chicago local (Oak Park, actually), there appeared to be plenty of friends and family in the crowd. Eleanor went the Ted Leo route, a solo act playing an electric guitar. Typically a singer-songwriter playing solo will go acoustic, as the instrument tends to allow the performer to improvise some percussion. With just the electric, all you're getting is the guitar, but in the right hands, it can work. Whereas Ted basically plays his lead guitar parts as if he had a band behind him, Eleanor's set had more of a demo feel, like she was previewing songs that would be fleshed out at some point in the future. Of course, she's already done that on the album, and she announced that she'll be back with a full band "sometime around Halloween".

Like their Schuba's shows earlier this year, the Hideout is a venue that really lends itself well to her personality. She comes off as shy, but funny, and the bits of crowd interaction are really enjoyable. I was a bit surprised that she didn't play more from the new album, but I really look forward to hearing the full band arrangements in the fall.

Setlist - I'm creating my own titles for the new songs:

• I Won't Fall Apart on You Tonight
• Scenes From Bensonhurst
• That Was When I Knew - (new song)
• My Mistakes
• Trouble Comes Running - (Spoon cover)
• Noise in the Distance - (new song)
• Lost at See - (Fiery Furnaces song)
• Heaven
• After Perfection - (new song)
• Early Earthquakes
• Tropical Iceland - (Fiery Furnaces song)
• Inn of the Seventh Ray
• Trying Not to Stare Into the Sun - (new song)

My Mistakes


I Won't Fall Apart on You Tonight

The Year in Music Vol. 1 - Live Shows

It's December 6th, and at current, I have a ticket to one more show before the year ends (Tennis @ Schuba's), with no immediate plans to add any others. So how do the numbers add up for 2010?

• Shows attended (not including Pitchfork) - 46
• Sets witnessed (including Pitchfork) - ~90

Shows by venue:

• Lincoln Hall - 15
• Schuba's - 8
• Metro - 8
• Empty Bottle - 4
• Bottom Lounge - 3
• Riviera - 2
• Vic - 2
• Logan Square Auditorium - 1
  
• Reggie's Rock Club - 1
• Double Door - 1
• Subterranean - 1

Bands Seen Multiple Times (including festival shows):

• Free Energy - 5
• Titus Andronicus - 4
• Surfer Blood - 4 (if you include both sets at Lincoln Hall on 10/7)
• The Drums - 2 (see the Surfer Blood note)
• New Pornographers - 2
  
• Generationals - 2
• Blue Giant - 2
• Local Natives - 2
• Avi Buffalo - 2
• Teenage Fanclub - 2
• Cymbals Eat Guitars - 2
  

Biggest Months:

• October - 15 shows
• April - 8 shows
• August - 5 shows
  
• No shows in January for some reason

Biggest letdowns of the year

Tie between the Pitchfork sets for Sleigh Bells and Girls. Of bands I hadn't seen before, those were the two sets I was most looking forward to. Girls played a daytime set in some pretty intense heat, but the crowd was fairly large. They just didn't deliver. They found a way to play almost all down-tempo songs, and for some reason, they felt the need to play them slower than they play them on the album. Sleigh Bells set was short, but that wasn't unanticipated. They have one album, and it's not very long. The problem with their set is that it was way too quiet. To sound good, Sleigh Bells need to be ear-splittingly loud. My friend and I had a normal volume conversation during their set. That shouldn't happen.

Biggest surprise of the year:

A few come to mind, such as the Pitchfork set by LCD Soundsystem. Never really listened to them before that show, but they really delivered. The 1900s show at the Empty Bottle just this past Saturday ranks pretty highly here as well. Their new album doesn't come off as a real rocker, but they really cranked up the energy during the show. The Drums shows at Lincoln Hall in October were pretty great, too. Everyone I was with went to those shows to see Surfer Blood. Everyone left much more impressed with the Drums.

But for me personally, the best surprise was when Miles Kurosky to the stage at Schuba's backed by two former members of Beulah. With roughly half of the last formation of Beulah in attendance, I was able to get a few autographs on my setlist from their final shows in Chicago in 2004. The show itself was pretty great, too. Definitely worth missing Spoon.

Best single night of music - Non-festival:

April 30th. Cymbals Eat Guitars & Los Campesinos! at the Metro, followed by Generationals and the Apples in Stereo at Lincoln Hall. Perfectly timed so that I could see all four sets. The first time I had hit two different shows at two different venues in the same night (though I did it about three more times later in the year).

A close second goes to October 13th. I was invited to see New Pornographers play a small club set at lunch, which was recorded by WXRT. I followed that show up with a double bill of Surfer Blood and the Drums at Lincoln Hall. It was a night on which they were playing both an early show and a late show. I had a ticket for the early show, which I was told at the door would also be valid for the late show. I had some friends at the early show, and a friend at the late show, so I stuck around for both.

Best single day of music - Festival:

The Saturday of Pitchfork was the second best day of the festival on paper, but turned out to be the best day in terms of the quality of the sets. It started with Free Energy kicking off the day in 90+ degree heat at 1:00. Titus Andronicus followed that up at 3:00. Wolf Parade played a pretty solid set at about 7:00, and LCD Soundsystem ended the night in front of a huge crowd at 8:30 or so.

Top Five shows of the year:

HM) Brian Jonestown Massacre @ the Metro - 5/30: The last time I saw them, it was ridiculous. A two hour show with 10 songs, either ending with overly long and patience trying ragas, or extended rants from Anton Newcombe. This time? A near original lineup including Joel Gion and Matt Hollywood. Two hours, about 20 songs, and all of their best stuff from the Give it Back/Strung Out in Heaven period. Really impressive.

5) The Walkmen @ Double Door - 8/6: This was their Lollapalooza aftershow. And quite frankly, anytime the Walkmen play, there's a chance that their show will be in my top five of the year. They're America's finest touring rock band in my opinion, and the band most worthy of my entertainment dollar. They played a selection of material from their not-yet-released album Lisbon (since released), and now I can't wait to see them again having listened to the album lord knows how many times. I missed their follow up show in Chicago because I had tickets for Guided By Voices on the same night. I considered driving to Madison the next night for their show (a Thursday), but that was the same day as the Drums/Surfer Blood show.

4) Foreign Born/Free Energy @ the Empty Bottle - 3/5: I'd seen Foreign Born, who's Person to Person was one of my favorite albums of 2009, a few months earlier at the end of 2009 while I was in Los Angeles. They put on a great show, and they're perfect for a small venue. This was also the first time I saw Free Energy at the suggestion of an acquaintance who writes for Chicagoist. They were pretty great live. Good enough to see about four more times in 2010.

3) Deerhunter @ the Metro - 10/14: These guys were on my radar for a while, but I started listening to Halcyon Digest a few weeks before this show. I fell in love with it and snagged a ticket when I saw they were coming. The show lived up to the excitement generated by the album. They're now a can't miss band for me when they come to town.

2) Titus Andronicus @ Subterranean - 7/16: This was a Friday night show after the first evening of Pitchfork, which featured Broken Social Scene and Modest Mouse. T/A played a tiny club in sweltering heat, at least a good 10 hotter inside than outside on arguably the hottest weekend of the year. But they were incredible in that setting. Just feeding off the heat and energy from the packed crowed. I probably lost about 3 pounds in sweat during their set. It was the best of the four sets I saw them play this year.

1) The Fiery Furnaces @ the Empty Bottle - 6/18: A Friday night show while my family was in town for the Angels/Cubs series at Wrigley Field. I went to this show with my brother, a real trooper. He arrived in Chicago at about 7:00 am on the red-eye from Anchorage. He sat through a baseball game at 1:00 pm, went to dinner with our parents at 7:00 pm, and after a brief nap, was ready for this show around 11:00 pm.

As for the show itself, it was an hour of pure brilliance. I've never seen anything like it. They played for an hour straight, and I when I say straight, I mean straight. No breaks. Not even for applause between songs. It was like an hour long 25 song medley. And they were impressively tight. Not one missed beat or note all night long. I can't even describe how incredible that is based on what they played. Time signatures and keys jumped around like a kangaroo on meth. It was pure perfection. And to top the night off, while chatting with Eleanor Friedberger at the merch table after the show, she commented on my Super Furry Animals t-shirt. It was a really great night.

Tomorrow: Albums of the year - Honorable Mentions

Titus Andronicus @ the Bottom Lounge - 4/7/10

Skipped the first opener, and stood around for the Saps, a local Chicago band that reminded me a fair amount of Team Band. I love Team Band, but they're kind of a hard band to emulate without making it really obvious. Maybe it's all coincidence and they there's no influence there, but it sure sounded like it to me.

TA took the stage around 10:45 or so, and played for a good 1:20, with no encores. But man, it was a really rollicking set. There's so much energy and passion in Patrick Stickles' screaming voice that it's hard not to get sucked in. And especially with the new material, with their slow, quiet intros that descend into a maelstrom of noise, they just have a way of sucking you in until you can't help but give in to noise. I'm not usually one for a lot of audience participation, but listen to the first song linked below and, well, if you see them live, try not to sing along with the Ooo Ooo - Na Na Na part at the 2:44 mark (note, this video is cut to only half the song - they cut out a great second half for the radio edit).



For as much energy as they put into their set, I'm a little surprised they played as long as they did. I was also curious to see how they would handle the new material. For those of you unfamiliar, 'The Monitor' is a sort of concept album about a kid who leaves New Jersey for Boston, and ends up returning to New Jersey after not quite finding what he was looking for. The kicker is that it's told through Civil War imagery. It's really quite impressive, but the album itself is a 10 song, 67 minute drama with each song segueing into the next. If you didn't know where the track breaks were, you could probably figure them out, but it would be tough, and you'd probably get some wrong. So the question was whether they could play some of those songs as stand alones, or whether they'd play the album from beginning to end. The played them as stand alones, out of order, mixing in songs from the first album, and it played great in my opinion. The incomplete and out of order setlist (actually, I think this is the right order, since I stole it from this guy - in my own defense, I had all the songs right):

• A More Perfect Union (opened with this)
• Joset of Nazareth Blues
• A Pot in Which to Piss
• Upon Viewing Breughle's 'Landscape with the Fall of Icarus'
• Richard II
• Fear and Loathing in Mawhaw, NJ
• No Future Part Three: Escape From No Future
• Titus Andronicus
• My Time Outside the Womb
• The Battle of Hampton Roads
• Titus Andronicus Forever
• Four Score and Seven

The opener and closer are right, and the middle of that setlist is a rough estimate of where songs fit in. So many of the songs on the new album are of this epic length and structure that they could easily be closers, but Four Score and Seven did the trick nicely (Battle of Hampton Roads, all 14 minutes of it, closes the album).

As for the concert experience, I was just outside the mosh pit, which was a perfect place to stand. I'm well past moshing age, and I was never much of a mosher to begin with. Still, I was close enough to feel like a part of the action. I don't love the Bottom Lounge, but it's growing on me a bit. I still wish they would publish the door time AND the show time so that I'm not tricked into getting there an hour early, but I've learned to work around that. Hopefully these guys get a good slot at Pitchfork, where there's a good crowd that can really get into the atmosphere of the music. Pics and another couple vids below.

Titus Andronicus (song)


Four Score and Seven

Miles Kurosky w/ Pancho San @ Schuba's - 4/1/10

After failing to reach commercial success to match their critical acclaim, San Francisco pop outfit Beulah broke up in the summer of 2005. Actually, they officially called it quits before their last tour, which made that sort of a farewell tour. They played two nights in Chicago at the Abbey on that tour, both of which I attended. I was pretty much up at the stage on the second night, and was able to grab an extra setlist (something I've only cared to do one other time). I popped the setlist up on my refrigerator and it's been there ever since.

Last night Miles Kurosky, Beulah's former front-man, was in town playing material from his new solo album 'the Desert of Shallow Effects'. Because it was at Schuba's, a venue where you can usually chat with the performers afterward, I figured I'd bring the setlist with me to possibly get it autographed. Little did I know that the opening act, Pancho San, would consist of former Beulans Patrick Abernathy and Eli Crews. Pancho San also made up 3/5 of Kurosky's backing band for his solo material. The upshot is I was able to get all three to sign the setlist.

As for the show itself, Pancho San were pretty good. I've seen Patrick play with Beulah and with Rogue Wave, but this was the first time I'd seen him sing. Perhaps it's because I knew they were from San Francisco before seeing them play, but they seemed to deliver what one would typically consider the San Francisco sound. Jangly guitars, up-tempo pop-songs, and more or less ear friendly. I need to spend a little time with their album, which I picked up from the merch table after the show.

Miles Kurosky has endured some physical ailments between the end of Beulah and the release of his solo album, but he hasn't let that affect him. Pitchfork likened the new album to a fifth Beulah record, and that's both accurate and quite alright with me. It's nice to hear a familiar voice again, and the music on the new album is excellent. Miles played most of it last night, as should have been expected.

He also finished out the evening with some Beulah classics. The full band got together for "Emma Blowgun's Last Stand", "Landslide Baby", and "Popular Mechanics for Lovers". Miles also filled the encore void (it is Schuba's after all) with a short medley of Beulah tunes featuring "If We Can Land a Man on the Moon, Surely I Can Win Your Heart", "You're Only King Once", and "Gene Autry".

Particularly impressive was the full horn section that showed up to play. The band was backed by a couple trumpets, and couple saxophones, and a trombone. According to the guys in the band, they'd never met the horn players before, but they ran through the set at sound check and decided to give it a go. If you're familiar with Beulah, a lot of their stuff had some large trumpet parts, handled by co-founder Bill Swan. This band filled the void left by his absence quite nicely, and added a lot of texture to Miles' solo stuff, which is also heavy on horns. Pictures and some MK and Beulah vids below.



Dog in the Burning Building

Emma Blowgun's Last Stand

Vampire Weekend @ the Riviera - 4/26/10

First time I've seen them live, and they pretty much lived up to the hype. It might have been the few beers beforehand, but this was a really easy show to get into. A nice thing about Vampire Weekend is that they've only got two records, and most of their songs are short, so they can play a pretty full set that covers virtually all of their album material. They played the entire new album, except for Giving Up the Gun (surprising, since that's a new single), and and I Think Ur a Contra. They played the entire first album except The Kids Don't Stand a Chance. They also threw in Ladies of Cambridge, a b-side from the Oxford Comma single.

This was only the second time I've been to the show at the Riviera (first show was Spoon about two and a half years ago). It's a little bigger venue than I normally frequent. It's got a capacity of about 2,500 people, about 10-15 times the size of a place like Schuba's, which is a bit more up my alley. But the acoustics at the Riv are excellent, so it's hard to complain. We skipped Abe Vigoda, who opened (a band on my radar that I haven't gotten around to yet), and by the time we got in, the venue was fairly full, so visuals weren't easy to come by. But compared to my companion/date, who is about 5'3", I had it pretty easy.

Quick Recaps: Surfer Blood, We Were Promised Jetpacks, and Ted Leo

Three concerts last week, bringing the 2010 total to five so far.

Surfer Blood @ Schuba's - 3/10/10

First up was Surfer Blood, a band out of Florida with a California sound. They played Schuba's, which is right around the corner of my apartment. That made this show very convenient, as I had spent the previous 2+ hours at the United Center watching the Kings lose to the Blackhawks in overtime. So I missed the opener (Turbo Fruits), but got into the club about 10 minutes before the headliners took the stage.

They've only got one album, so they unsurprisingly played pretty much that whole album, minus one or two (I don't think they played Slow Jabroni). It was a pretty short set, maybe 40-45 minutes or so, but they sounded great on their single "Swim". You can tell these guys are fairly new to the game, but they brought their good sound and put on a decent show.

We Were Promised Jetpacks @ Lincoln Hall - 3/11/10

Scottish kids out of Glasgow via Edinburgh in their early 20s. A friend told me, and wikipedia confirms, that their first gig was a battle of the bands at their high school, which they won. That was about seven years ago. Their first album was released last year and I'll crib from Pitchfork and call it sincere, anthemic rock, which it pretty much is. These guys actually had a really nice stage presence considering their youth, and it was a very entertaining set. They just released an EP last week, from which they took a couple songs, but mostly played tracks from their first album, including the album's penultimate track "Keeping Warm", an eight minute track that they turned into about 11-12 minutes thanks to a rollicking three minute introduction. I'll admit that part of the reason I went to this show was to hang out with the girl who turned me onto them, but the show was pretty good in its own right.

Ted Leo and the Pharmacists @ the Bottom Lounge - 3/13/10

Tough call on whether to go to this show, since it was the Saturday before St. Patrick's Day, which is practically a religious holiday in Chicago, provided your religion requires the consumption of a great deal of alcohol. I skipped the openers to drink with some friends, but I got into the club in time to hear TL/Rx play their first song. Their new album 'the Brutalist Bricks' just came out last week, and it's pure Ted Leo. Elements of punk, power-pop, and a tinge of traditional Irish music combine to make the TL/Rx formula, and it's worked well enough over the last decade that there isn't much reason to change things. Which isn't to say this is just a companion piece to their last album 'Living with the Living'. It's not. And as it's title suggests, it's a little more muscle bound. A little lighter on the hooks that sucked me in on 'Shake the Sheets', a little heavier on the pounding rhythms and desperate vocals (save for One Polaroid a Day).

He played at least eight or nine songs off the new album, and threw in some older tunes for fun, hitting a bit of each album (Timorous Me from 'Tyranny of Distance'; The High Party from 'Hearts of Oak'; Little Dawn from 'Shake the Sheets'; Bottle of Buckie from 'Living...'). A good solid 1:15 of content, which is good from a band that puts so much into each show.

Vampire Weekend is up next in two weeks.

Foreign Born w/ Free Energy & Clovers @ the Empty Bottle - 3/5/10

Alright, so I missed Clovers, but my excuse was that I was pretty sick this weekend, so it's a minor miracle that I made it out for Free Energy and Foreign Born, but I'm glad I did. I'd heard mention of Free Energy here and there, but this post by Jim Kopeny (I went to law school with his brother) at Chicagoist sold me on getting there in time for their set. I read someone who compared them to Thin Lizzy style 70s guitar pop/rock, and I think that's a pretty good description. They had a bit of their own following, and the crowd in front of the stage was really digging their set. They were definitely worth my time, and a band I'd like to catch if they come back and headline somewhere.

At some point last year, I made a list of bands on my radar that I needed to check out, which includes stuff like the Thermals, Passion Pit, Cymbals Eat Guitars, etc. One of these bands was Dirty Projectors who, as it turns out, made my favorite album of 2009. Another one was Foreign Born, who made my third or fourth favorite album of 2009 (Animal Collective and Grizzly Bear are in the mix as well). I don't know how they got on the list. I literally cannot recall what made me want to listen to these guys, but whatever, it was a good decision.

I saw them live for the first time back in December. I was flying home for the holidays, and was able to push my flight up a day so that I could get home in time to catch them at Spaceland. They put on an excellent show that night, and it was a pretty good crowd. We even ran into Arianna Murray and Aaron Espinoza of Earlimart, a fellow Silverlake band. I had a chance to chat with Matt Popieluch, the front-man and one of the creative forces behind Foreign Born, and was able to tell him how much I enjoyed that last show.

They played an efficient 45-50 minutes or so, playing pretty much the entire first album, minus the final two tracks (See Us Home, and Wait in This Chair). They also played Into Your Dream for their first album, and a song off of their EP, released prior to their first album. Highlights were 'It Grew On You', which they didn't play in LA. They also opened with a great version of Early Warnings, into which they built about a one minute intro. I'm not usually one for audience participation, but I couldn't keep from clapping along at the appropriate point. Vacationing People is always a treat, and Blood Oranges also sounded really good.

You can check the previous post for a couple more vids, but here are live versions of Blood Oranges and Vacationing People. Pics from the show below the vids. First three pics are Foreign Born, last two are Free Energy.

Coming Attractions - Foreign Born

Foreign Born is the next show on tap for 2010. They'll be playing the Empty Bottle for a mere $5, plus some small service charges. 'Person to Person' was one of my favorite albums of 2009, and their show at Spaceland in December was excellent. Really looking forward to this one.

The first song is "Into Your Dream" from the previous album 'On the Wing Now' (and apparently it was on the Chuck soundtrack. The next two are "Winter Games" and "Early Warnings" from 'Person to Person'. They played all three at Spaceland. Anybody who has been to Catalina Island should like the video for "Early Warnings". You can also check out a live version of my favorite FB song, "Vacationing People" here at Song of the Day.

St. Vincent @ the Metro - 2/18/10

I said I was going to do this more often, so here it is. First show of the year for 2010 was the lovely Annie Clark, aka St. Vincent, at the Metro last week. Really an excellent show. She played almost all of her most recent album "Actor". I think she only left out "Neigbors". She also played many of the highlights from "Marry Me".

Best moments of the show for me were Marrow, which actually stuck pretty closely to the album version, and Save Me From What I Want. I'm pretty sure she played a solo version of Paris is Burning, but I'll admit that the whole night isn't crystal clear, and I may remember that from reading about her playing it at another show. It was almost a week ago, and I met someone out for a couple drinks before the show (also why we missed the opener), so things are a bit fuzzy. She finished the night off with a tremendous version of Your Lips Are Red, which descended into a cacophony of angular fuzz guitars, piano, and horns before flowing into the laid back major key ending. Kind of reminds me of a river flowing through a very rocky rapids before emptying into a wide, calm valley. Really a great way to end the show. Pictures and a vid below (vid not from the show, obviously).

This Is a Punk Rock Band

It's not irony. It's not rock and roll. They're just talking to the kids.

I've now seen Art Brut* four times since June, and the only regret that I have is that I've missed the other five or six chances I've had to see them in that time. There's something to be said for music shows that are simply fun. I love the Super Furry Animals. I think the Walkmen are one of the finest live acts I've ever seen. But I've never had more fun at a show than I've had an Art Burt show.

They played last night at Subterranean with Team Band (who were a whole lot of fun themselves). Once again, they failed to disappoint. Loud. Energetic. Polite. Willing to mix it up with the crowd. If you ever have a chance, do yourself a favor and please, please go see this band live.

*I'd embed that video if I could, but it's disabled. It features Eddie Argos' girlfriend Dyan Valdes of the band Blood Arm, who is very nice. I chatted with her and Eddie for a bit before one of their shows at Spaceland in Silverlake.

Demons Out


Direct Hit Interview


Emily Kane

The Raveonettes w/ Living Things @ the Empty Bottle - 8/8/09

In the very early days of this blog, when I was still sort of experimenting, I wrote a short post about a band that I was going to be seeing in the near future. They were the headliner in a three act bill, and I was really only going because I wanted to see the second act, Autolux (who were, quite frankly, a bit disappointing). When I wrote that post, I was not sold on what I'd heard from the headliner. But at that show, I fell in love with the Raveonettes, and four years later, they keep getting better.



I saw the Raveonettes for the third time on Saturday night, the day before their set at Lollapalooza. And for the third time, they put on a terrific show. It helps that their music translates very well to a live setting. Drenched in feedback and distortion, they don't rely on slick production. This works for two reasons: First, it's much easier to replicate stuff in person that already sounds fuzzy to begin with; Second, that sort of sound, when played very loud, really envelopes the audience, and it's just not a feeling you can get via conventional media players. You're just drowning in it.



The Raveonettes are getting set to release their fifth album (if you consider Whip It On a proper album), and while their sound hasn't changed all that much, they've really gotten good at focusing on their strengths. Their lyrics are a little darker, but their sound is still bright, poppy, and laden with hooks. When I wrote that initial post, I described them as a sort of Buddy Holly as played by the Jesus and Mary Chain. They still fit that description, and it still sounds great, although their obvious affection for other acts of the period, like the Ronettes, is pretty evident as well (they even recorded a track with Ronnie Spector on their third album).

As for Sunday night, they were test driving some of the new tracks, which you can track down if you're so inclined. 'Suicide' is the one they played that I knew. But they hit the old stuff as well, dusting off Attack of the Ghost Riders from Whip It On. The rest of the set included (but was not limited to):

• That Great Love Sound (encore)
• Let's Rave On
• Aly Walk With Me
• Hallucinations
• Dead Sound
• Love in a Trashcan
• Red Tan
• Here Comes Mary
• Twilight (encore)
  

They played for about an 1:15 or so, which is set-length I can live with, even if there are a couple songs that they left out that I wanted to hear, like Noisy Summer and You Say You Lie. Noisy Summer is one of those songs that I was lukewarm on until I heard it live, at which point it really clicked, and has since become a favorite. Someone made a video for it, so I've posted it below. It's a great example of a song that sounds so innocent that you barely realize how abosolutely drenched in feedback it is. But once you realize it, it makes the song even better. Twilight was, again, a major highlight.

Noisy Summer


Twilight


Dead Sound

AC Newman and the Broken West @ Logan Square Auditorium - 3/25/09

So I've come to the conclusion that I'm really a horrible music writer. It actually has nothing to do with my skills (or lack thereof) as a writer. My problem is that I can't really criticize. I only go to shows that I want to see. Which means I only see bands that I know I already like, which means I'm going to like the show. Every review comes off as a fanboy review. So what follows is not a review, but a recap. I'm basically going to tell you why I like the bands I like so much.

This was a smaller crowd than my last Logan Square show. I saw Los Campesinos! with Titus Andronicus as the opener a couple months ago and the place was packed. The Broken West took the stage about ten minutes after 8:00, and the place was still half empty. Truth be told, I love the Broken West, and I think I've seen every show they've played in Chicago since 2007 when I first saw them open for America's finest live act, the Walkmen. They played a sample of the old album, but the bulk of the set came from thenew album and the first album, and it was all well mixed. The list:

• On the Bubble
• So it Goes
• Down in the Valley
• Gwen Now and Then
• Auctioneer
• Ambuscade
• Got It Bad
• Elm City
• House of Lies
• Perfect Games

AC Newman and band followed shortly thereafter, and I have to say, I really appreciate bands that play on time. They started shortly after nine, which is what I expect from a headliner when I see a show that's billed as an 8:00 show. Also, I have to give credit to the two females in the band (bass and violin) who were drinking wine. Rarely do you see wine consumed on stage.

Anyway, I'd say they played a typical mix of old and new. When an act is supporting a new album, you expect about 65-35 mix, and that's pretty much what we got. I think they played all but one song from the new album (honestly, at this point, I can't remember if they failed to play 'Elemental' or 'Thunderbolts'. It's been a day or so). And honestly, he played a couple songs from the Slow Wonder that I'm not crazy about (Cloud Prayer and Come Crash). But he hit most of hte highlights, and he closed with the Town Halo, which is still his best song, and is a great song if you have a violin player.

All in all a great show. Great venue, solid set, on-time, no complaints. Two bands that I really love. Hope they come back soon.

Upcoming:
Destroyer (May)
Doves (May)
Art Brut twice (June)
X (June)
Pitchfork Festival (July)

Some samples:

Broken West


AC Newman


AC Newman

Ted Leo @ AV-Aerie - 12/10/08 - Updated with link to photos

This is the third time I've seen Ted Leo live, but the first time I've seen him with no Pharmacists*.  It was kind of an interesting aesthetic, really.  I've seen singer/songwriters before.  I've even seen singer/songwriters who were part of a band play without the band (Grant Lee Phillips doing his Buffalo material, for example).  But I've never seen a singer/songwriter play something pretty close to the same arrangements he plays in the band setting without the band behind him.  

In other words, usually when guys play a solo set like this, they have an acoustic set up.  The acoustic guitar almost allows the artist to add a little of his or her own percussion to a given song.  Ted Leo basically just played lead guitar for the entire night.  Picture him playing a typical TL/Rx show, but without anyone behind him.  It was really cool to see once.  I'm not sure I'd be particularly jazzed about seeing it again (I would go, of course), and it's really made me want to listen to the studio versions of all the stuff he played.  

Speaking of the stuff he played, he sample a little from just about every album, and played a bunch of covers including songs by Lungfish, the Waco Brothers, Blondie, and set ending rendition of Bruce Springsteen's 'Dancing in the Dark'.  From his own songs, he played a bunch of stuff that was unfamiliar, but also played:

• Timorous Me (which had some improvised handclaps)
• Where Have All the Rude Boys Gone.
• The High Party
• Ballad of the Sin Eater
• Me and Mia
• Bleeding Powers
• Colleen
• Bottle of Buckie

He played for about an hour and a half, only stopping occasionally to tune and joke around with the crowd.  He was entertaining even when he wasn't playing.  

As for the venue, it was the third floor of a semi-industrial building converted for music in an industrial part of town just northwest of the United Center.  I imagine, per their website, that this was one of the "fund raising arts and cultural events whose revenue will go to local socially and/or environmentally focused initiatives in partnerships chosen on a bi-annual schedule."  It had a really high ceiling, but you wouldn't know, because the whole performance space was covered by a large parachute draped from above to make it feel much more intimate.  The house lights never went down, which almost gave it the feel of a casual evening with a friend, assuming your friends invite Thax Douglas over to read strange poems.  Even beer was cheap.  $2 bucks for a can of High Life, and that was a "suggested donation".   *UPDATE* - Photos of the night at this link.  Pretty good look at the venue.  

So a really cool show, in a very different type of setting than I'm used to.  I look forward to seeing who else they'll book there.  Enjoy some Ted. Two versions of Rude Boys to choose from, and two great live songs back to back.

*There may have been actual pharmacists in the audience.  I didn't poll everyone's occupation.

Rude Boys solo live


Rude Boys studio recording (you'll have to turn it up a bit)


Timorous Me/Walking To Do

Recent Concerts

So I haven't really been doing concert reviews or recaps lately, but that doesn't mean I haven't been going to shows. August was a little on the slow side in the wake of the Pitchfork Festival, but September has been picking it back up. In the last week or so, we had three really great shows.

Spiritualized @ Metro - 9/8/08

I finally saw J. Spaceman for the first time at P-fork, and that show was essentially the hour long outdoor version of their regular show, so the set was pretty similar, only about a half hour or forty minutes longer. Most of the extra time was taken up by older material, which I particularly enjoyed since I didn't see any of the shows in support of those albums.

The P-fork set made appearances here and there, mostly in a good way. He again opened with 'You Lie You Cheat', which devolves into noise, then cuts beautifully into 'Shine A Light', from the Laser Guided Melodies album. He finished the set, again, with 'Come Together' from Ladies and Gentlemen.... which segued into the old Spacemen 3 tune 'Take Me to the Other Side'. Added in along the way were some new songs (Death Take Your Fiddle), some Spiritualized classics ('Ladies and Gentlemen We Are Floating in Space', 'Lay Back in the Sun') and another Spacemen 3 number (either 'Walkin' With Jesus' or 'Sound of Confusion', depending on what album you have). He ended the night with a rousing rendition of 'Lord Can You Hear Me'.

Their live set, at least indoors is very loud and engrossing. You've heard the phrase "wall of sound". Well, this is an ocean of sound, and you're drowning in it. It just absolutely engulfs the entire venue. The pacing was pretty good. The two songs that start this set really draw you in. There's little to no crowd rapport, not even a "thank you" between songs, though I think he said it on the way out. It's really quite an experience. An excellent live show, and one I hope I get the chance to see again.

You Lie You Cheat


Take Me To The Other Side (Live)


Grand Ole Party opened. I saw them open for someone earlier this year as well. Three piece band with a female drummer, who also handles lead vocals. She's got quite a voice. Entertaining act.

The Walkmen @ Metro 9/12/08

This is the third or fourth time I've seen them in the last year and a half, so it's been interesting to see them go from supporting "A Hundred Miles Off" to trying out some new material, to eventually supporting that material, most of which appears on the new album "You and Me". It's an album that didn't really grab me at first, certainly not as quickly as the last one, but after five or six listens, it's really grown on me and might be my favorite album yet.

The set lasted a little under an hour and half, which is probably the longest set I've seen them do. The set was heavy on the album, and light on everything else. They played the classics. 'Wake Up', 'Little House of Savages', 'Thinking of a Dream I Had'. They played some songs that are much better live than on the record, like 'All Hands and the Cook', and 'What's In It For Me'. The new album has a lot of horn parts, so they were able to play 'Louisiana'. And they proved again that 'The Rat' is the best four minutes of live music on the planet.

But the new album really made up the meat of the show, and fortunately, it's a really good album for a live show. It's got some slower tracks that help round out the pacing, but the standouts from the album were the standouts in the live set. 'Donde Esta La Playa', 'On the Water', 'the Blue Route', 'Canadian Girl' all delivered. The crowd seemed fairly familiar with the new material, as loud cheers went out upon hearing the opening strums of 'In the New Year', the first single and a real highlight of the show.

As usual, the Walkmen, more than any other band I've seen a bunch of time, are more than worth the price of admission. Along with the Super Furry Animals, they're probably may favorite act currently in existence, and their live shows are really terrific. The opening acts were pretty interesting too. Ezra Furman and the Harpoons were kind of a straightforward pop-rock four piece with a funny frontman, and klezmer-rock six piece Golem were, well, something I wouldn't expect to see at a rock show, and something I'd even less expect to like, but they put on a very entertaining set. No complaints.

In the New Year


On the Water



The Broken West @ Schuba's 9/15/08

Small crowd, but Monday night shows aren't typically heavily attended, especially for lesser known acts like the Broken West. But that doesn't mean it wasn't a great show. I saw these guys open for the Walkmen last year, and I've seen them another four times since, and they always put on a good set. They released a new album last week, their second, so the set drew heavily from that, but they worked in some favorites from the first album as well. This is the type of show where you can hang around and chat with the band afterward, so that's kind of fun. I try to wait to buy albums at shows if possible, because I think they get a bigger piece of the pie. This is an L.A. based band, around Silverlake I believe, so it's nice to support local acts from my hometown.

A band called the Builders and the Butchers opened for them. They're kind of folky, but really heavy themes. Lost of death and afterlife sorts of stuff. Like if the Decemberists were a little harder and sang a lot of dirges. But the music is really engaging. I usually need to listen to an album a few times before it connects, but I was digging their debut on first listen. I was wearing a t-shirt from the Moose's Tooth, a pizzeria and brew pub in anchorage. The lead singer saw it started up a conversation about Alaska. Turns out half this band is from Anchorage, and a couple went to the school where my brother used to teach. Small world.

Down in the Valley

Transcendent

Three years ago, while the Wrens and AC Newman were the big interests for me at the Intonation Festival, at the time curated by Pitchfork, later to become the Pitchfork Festival, it was Broken Social Scene that really blew me away. I owned "You Forgot it in People" at the time, but it wasn't until I saw them at that show that it really clicked for me, and that set was the highlight.

Two years ago it was the Walkmen and Destroyer that piqued my interest, and both were excellent, but when all was said and done, it was Ted Leo that made the biggest impression on me. He was someone I hadn't listened to very much at the time, and I left the park a big fan, and immediately bought Shake the Sheets and Hearts of Oak.

Last year, I'm not gonna lie. The lineup mostly sucked. And the people I usually go with couldn't make it. So I had tickets that went unused for Friday and Saturday, but I showed up for a couple hours on Sunday to hear New Pornographers play a few tracks from their, at that time, unreleased new album Challengers.

This year, Sunday was the big draw, with Les Savy Fav, the Apples in Stereo, Spoon, etc. But for the first time in four years, it was the one band that I really wanted to see that delivered the best performance, and easily the best set I've ever seen at a festival setting, leaving me hungry for a show at a more intimate, or at least indoor venue. Spiritualized delivered far and away the best set.

I'll admit that I came to the show expecting to hear a stripped down, mostly acoustic, mellow set of material off the new album. Most of the shows that J. Spaceman played since his return to health were of the Acoustic Mainline variety (a take off on the Electric Mainline - Pure Phase album). But to my surprise, he showed up with two awesome backup vocalists, and a fully plugged in five piece setup. And while they did the mellow stuff at times, they simply blew doors when they wanted to. He played a few songs off the new album, most notably Sweet Talk and the first single, Soul On Fire. He also reached back to Amazing Grace for Cheapster and She Kissed Me (and it Felt Like a Hit).

But the highlights came early and late. They opened with You Lie, You Cheat off of the new album (Songs in A&E). As that faded out, the band slowly worked it's way into downright numbing version of Shine a Light, from Lazer Guided Melodies. If you've got a copy of the track handy, fast forward to about the 11 minute mark, picture the sax is a guitar, and imagine that the wall of background fuzz is about 100 times louder than you'd expect, and you'll get the idea. After working through the rest of the set, they finally launched into Come Together, the one song my friend wanted to hear, and for me, that was set to be a real highlight, until they segued out of the song, into some distortion and reached back into the Spacemen 3 catalogue for arguably my favorite Pierce associated track ever, Take Me To the Other Side, which was a really terrific way to end the set. If I weren't a Spiritualized fan before the show, I would have been on the way out. It really was transcendent, and it was probably one of the five best live sets I've ever seen, regardless of setting. I'll try to link to some videos as soon as P4k puts them up.

This should be a link to their set for streaming via audio. If it's not, then enter the time and date (July 20, 5:00 pm) and it should work.

X at the Metro - A Quick Recap

So it's the 31st anniversary of the formation of one of the most influential punk bands ever, L.A.'s seminal X. I saw them a few years ago when they played the House of Blues. It was the first time I'd seen the original lineup, though I've seen John Doe play solo a few times and he usually throws a couple of X songs into his solo sets.

This was the fourth or fifth show of their current tour. They took the stage a little after 10:30 and played for about an hour and 15 minutes. I'll cop to never having seen their shows when they were actually producing new music (I was just a little kid), but the amount of energy they bring to their live shows can't have been much greater back then. They were a little sloppy at times, probably because they had such a long set list. It's easy to lose your place on the page when you've got 20 songs listed. Exene Cervenka chalked it up to being "new at this". But there's nothing more fun that watching Billy Zoom, wide stanced and almost motionless, standing there with a huge grin on his face while delivering some of the most complex guitar work found on any punk record. From Buddy Siegal in the OC Weekly:

Dave Alvin, the former Blasters' axe man who ultimately replaced Zoom, is a renowned guitar hotshot in his own right, but he soon learned that stepping into Zoom's cowboy boots was no easy task. "I was amazed when I had to actually sit down and learn 32 songs in two weeks," says Alvin. "How Billy Zoom put his parts together was amazing. For a three-piece band, his orchestration on guitar was really tremendous. They were almost mathematically perfect arrangements. Billy likes tinkering with machines and electronics, and in some ways, his guitar parts are put together like schematics. I'm more of a primitive. I lack that kind of technique, and Billy was very, very advanced. I learned a lot; my guitar playing improved a lot after I had to sit down and learn all of his parts. There's a part of me that's forever in his debt, from having my Billy Zoom guitar lessons. A lot of punk bands-a lot of any bands-don't have these kind of intelligent guitar parts. That guy is really good."

Decide for yourself in the samples below. Here's the incomplete and out of order setlist (they played at least six or seven more songs than this - probably closer to ten):

• Once Over Twice
• We're Desperate
• In This House That I Call Home
• White Girl
• Back to the Base
• Your Phone's Off the Hook, But You're Not
• Johnny Hit and Run Paulene
• Soul Kitchen
• Nausea
• Los Angeles
• The New World
• True Love
• Hungry Wolf
• Motel Room in my Bed
• Because I Do
• Riding With Mary
• Blue Spark
• The Unheard Music

I was pretty stoked that they played Blue Spark. That's one of my favorite X songs, and they didn't play it the last time I saw them. Aside from that, you always expect to hear Hungry Wolf, Los Angeles, and White Girl, and they didn't disappoint last night. Here are those three (though the Hungry Wolf video is missing the beginning for some reason - also, give White Girl about a minute twenty before the song actually starts):

X - The Hungry Wolf

Sun Times Review

Pretty Close to a Dream Lineup

At least until the Lassie Foundation comes to Chicago.

April 4th. The Vic.

White Rabbits.



The Walkmen.



Spoon.



All on the same Goddamn night. Thank God for internet pre-sales.

Super Furry Animals w/ Jeffrey Lewis and Times New Viking at the Metro - 2/16/08 - A Quick Recap

SFA is a band for whom I no longer have any expectations where their live shows are involved. They've released eight complete albums, as well as a b-side collection, and when there is that much material from which to draw, it's a waste of effort to go to the show expecting to hear your "favorites". At the same time, because virtually their entire catalog is so good, it's almost impossible to leave the show without having heard a bunch of stuff that you wanted to hear.

Jeffrey Lewis opened the evening. One dude, one guitar, and few hand made comic books. It was actually a really cool set. It lasted about 20 minutes, and his stuff is certainly unique. It's like spoken word set to music, but nowhere near as pretentious as that sounds. He also draws comic books and presents them as "videos". Here's an example of what you're in for (he played this last night).


Times New Viking took the stage next, and they pretty much provide about a half hour of noise. It's not bad, mind you, but I think they're an acquired taste. They make Guided By Voices sound slick and over-produced.



SFA took the stage a little after 11:00, and in a first for the Furries since I've been seeing them, there were no video screens, no grand entrance. There were still a few theatrics, as the opening strains of Slow Life announced their arrival. Huw Bunford, Cian Ciaran, Guto Price, and Daffyd Ieuan took the stage, picked up their instruments and started playing along. Gruff Rhys strolled out shortly thereafter in his Power Rangers helmet and sung through the rest of the song. (Go here for pictures).

From there it a solid 90 minutes of SFA as they played material covering most of their career. They ignored Fuzzy Logic, but every other album was represented. And as expected, they played a fair amount from the new album "Hey Venus". Here's the incomplete and out of order setlist, though again, I'm fairly sure this is complete (I should probably give this a new name):

• She's Got Spies
• Do or Die
• Keep the Cosmic Trigger Happy
• Calimero
• Ice Hockey Hair
• The Man Don't Give a Fuck
• Rings Around the World
• Juxtaposed With You
• Receptacle for the Respectable
• Hello Sunshine
• Golden Retriever
• Slow Life
• Zoom
• The Gateway Song
• Run Away
• Gift That Keeps on Giving
• Neo-Consumer
• Into the Night
• Baby Ate My Eight Ball

As is their custom, they closed with "the Man Don't Give a Fuck", though it didn't play for 20 minutes as it usually does, probably because there was no video screen backing them up. Also a first, there was no encore. And really, there was no encore required. They played roughly the same amount of time and material as they'd normally play. In fact, at the end, Huw held up a sign saying goodbye to Chicago, and Gruff held up a sign that said "Resist Phony Encores". And that was that. Another superb SFA show. When they've hit this town, they've never played anything but a terrific show. Can't wait until they come back. Until then, enjoy Neo-Consumer (live on David Letterman), Golden Retriever, and Receptacle for the Respectable.

The Whigs w/ the Rikters and Tulsa @ Schuba's - 2/9/08

Saw about half of the Rikters set, and I thought they were pretty good. Local Chicago act, so there will probably be more chances to see them. Tulsa followed with two really good songs, and then sort of went to a grungy alt-country thing that was good, but not great.

The Whigs took the stage a little after midnight and opened the set with the opening tracks off their two albums to get the crowd going. They switched back and forth between albums for a few songs before settling into the newer stuff, and threw out a few covers toward the end. Setlist below, which is actually complete this time, and in order for the first few songs:

• Nothing is Easy
• Like a Vibration
• Technology
• Production City
• OK, Alright
• Violet Furs
• Half the World Away
• I Never Want to Go Home
• Right Hand on My Heart
• Sleep Sunshine
• Hot Bed
• Already Young
• God's Biographer
  
• Hey, You, Get Off of My Cloud
• Need You, Need You
  

The first highlight was Already Young, which just feels like a great live track the first time you listen to it. They didn't disappoint, as the song drew arguably the loudest applause of the night until they played Right Hand On My Heart, which was also terrific.

Whenever I see a band like this, it always feels like there's one song on which I was lukewarm after listening to the album. Then I hear the live version and it blows me away. Hale Sunrise from the Broken West was like that. Last night that song was Half the World Away. It's a slower track, and the keyboards are prevalant. It's easy to tune out when you're just listening to it in the background while working. But about 2:45 into the song, there's a terrific bridge, which almost sounds like a studio jam. It actually really rocks, and in a loud, live setting, it was phenomenal. It's a perfect little digression that doesn't overstay it's welcome. From now on, that song will never sound the same to me.

They closed the set with a cover of the song God's Biographer by the Dutch band Bingo Trappers. Then, jackets off and sweaty from the performance, they braved the cold (about 15-20 degrees). Schuba's has no backstage. Bands head outside before playing their encore. Needless to say, it can be a bit of a shock to a band from Athens, GA. So before too long, they were back, and closed it out with Hey You, Get Off Of My Cloud, and finally Need You, Need You.

All in all it was a great hour of music, and I'm kicking myself for leaving early when they played with the Broken West a few months ago. I'll try not to make that mistake again. They didn't play Give 'Em All a Big Fat Lip, which was a bit of a disappointment, but really, no complaints.