The second-ever NYLON Summer Music Tour stopped at Washington’s Rock ‘n’ Roll Hotel on the evening of June 24. The Hotel – incidentally not a real working hotel – is a teensy weensy club in Northeast that usually hosts under-the-radar acts. All four acts on this bill – Jaguar Love, Plastiscines, Living Things, and Patrick Wolf – are considered indie, but they all have a distinctive style and aesthetic that made them stand out from one another and provide a good variety of musical styles for the night. Also of note: Plasticines and Patrick Wolf are the first two acts that have been signed to the brand-spanking-new NYLON Records label.
Jaguar Love is a Portland duo whose music is not easily described or given a certain label. Is it punk? Is it electronic? It’s a bit of both really. Vocalist Johnny Whitney is what I’d expect if you could successfully cross breed Robert Plant and David Johansen of the New York Dolls in a laboratory. Whitney for sure has the posturing and swagger of both, the blonde mop of curls of Plant, and the singing/shrieking vocal style of Johansen. Cody Votolato provides the driving guitar behind Jaguar Love’s sound, and in a slightly less manic way, he also moves effortlessly across the stage.
They began their set with the appropriately explosive “I Started a Fire” that got everyone moving, the background electronic effects pumping out an infectious beat throughout the entire set. “Freakout” was another notable tune – both Whitney and Votolato jumped into the crowd, with Whitney pumping his fist in the air and inciting the crowd to jump up and down with him in time to the music. Prior to this night, I was only familiar with one of their songs, “Highways of Love”, and it was fabulous live – and a good summation of the band’s performance.
Lead singer/guitarist of Plastiscines, Katty Besnard was dressed perfectly for a D.C. show – a red, white, and blue outfit and a white beret angled smartly on her blonde hair. Bassist Louise Basilien could be easily mistaken for a hippie-dressed Anne Hathaway. And you might think based on the sweet look of this band that they are only capable of making tinny pop music. Not so, I am most happy to be report. And it’s about time a strong girl group shook up the music scene.
All smiling broadly throughout the whole set, Plastiscines were clearly enjoying their first real tour of America. Despite having already having one album under their belts (LP1) and the second already recorded, they played two covers – “You’re No Good” (popularized by Linda Ronstadt in the mid ’70s) and Nancy Sinatra’s “love ‘em or leave ‘em” classic, “These Boots Were Made For Walkin’”. Maybe they felt they needed the covers to endear themselves to the audience? These really are unnecessary – their original numbers are strong and have a healthy dose of attitude. “Barcelona”, the first single off their sophomore album, lent a party atmosphere that got the whole club shaking. Their closing number, “Bitch”, confirmed what I had suspected all along: this French quartet knows how to rock just as hard as the boys do. Viva les Plastiscines!
St. Louis rock band Living Things were on third. Their lead singer/guitarist Lillian Berlin is no stranger to controversy – he likes to invite it, so it seems. So it is only fitting that he and his band would take pleasure in performing in such a politically charged city as ours. Wrapping himself in an American flag-themed rug, Lillian dedicated their 2005 hit “Bom Bom Bom” to all our brothers, sisters, mothers, and fathers serving in Iraq. He later encouraged the audience to boo, loudly, in response to California’s passing the controversial Proposition 8. My favorite from their set was “Oxygen”, the current single off their 2009 album Habeas Corpus – the guitars, drums, and rough vocals all come together for a riotously good time.
Other highlights included “Let It Rain” (an alt-rock classic in the making), “Bombs Away”, and “Snake Oil Salesman”; for the latter, Lillian grabbed several surprised folks out of the audience to come on stage and dance with him, the whole audience singing along to “everybody let’s keep the peace” of the chorus. Several times, Lillian proclaimed his love for “the land of O-BAM-A” – which of course elicited delighted cheers from the D.C. crowd. Later on in the set, Lillian asked if we as a city would adopt him, because “St. Louis bars have guns on display. Do you have guns?” I’d adopt the whole band if I could: between the screaming guitars, powerful drumbeats, and impressive vocals, I’m sure they could be counted on for a rollicking good gig every night. Living Things is definitely a band to keep your eye on.
And then came Patrick Wolf. The pièce de résistance and probably whom most of the people in the small venue that night came for. I’ve been lucky enough to have seen Patrick twice – once here in D.C. and once in England – and both times I was left awed by his live performance. His music runs the gamut from soft, introspective ballads about faraway towns to euphoric pop tunes, and from gothic, dark pieces redolent with classical mandolin and viola to songs with electronic beats appropriate for the dancefloor. I will never be bored with Patrick’s music because what he writes and records is always interesting, and his live shows are incredibly memorable. Who else writes amazingly evocative songs using a synthesizer, mandolin, and violin at the same time?
He’s our electrofolk superhero who always expresses his emotions better than we ever could. When he arrived on the Rock ‘n’ Roll Hotel stage, he had glitter all over the place as usual and was dressed quite theatrically as usual – I mistook him for Beethoven, with a powdered wig and a long black jacket with coattails. A friend later corrected me, saying that being in Washington, he must be trying to look like Thomas Jefferson (or maybe any one of our nation’s Founding Fathers). He sat down in front of the piano and began to play and sing “The Messenger”, the emotional closing track to his new album, the Bachelor. So beautiful.
Then he went the opposite direction musically, straight into the cacophonous “Kriegspiel”, followed by the electronic and commanding “Vulture”, the first single from the Bachelor. The audience excitedly sang and swayed to the music from this point forward. In addition to songs from the new album, he also reached into his back catalogue, including “Bluebells”, “Pigeon Song” (in which he and violinist Victoria Sutherland shared a gorgeous duet worthy of any concert hall), “Paris”, and the bouncy “Accident and Emergency” and “Tristan”. He decided to end the night with “A Boy Like Me”, a song off his debut album Lycanthropy. The appreciative audience loved every second of the gig – he could do no wrong. Can you blame us? Patrick Wolf pulled out all the stops for us with an incredible set. Hmm, maybe I will go back to see him again in England sooner than I thought…
Patrick Wolf Set List
The Messenger
Kriegspiel
Vulture
Bluebells
Damaris
Pigeon Song
Oblivion
Tristan
The Bachelor
Paris
Railway House
The Libertine
Wind In The Wires
Who Will?
Accident and Emergency
The Magic Position
Hard Times
A Boy Like Me
Patrick Wolf: website | myspace | @ Dot to Dot Festival, Rock City, Nottingham, England
Living Things: website | myspace | MP3 Minute: Living Things “Oxygen” | @ Midland Theatre, Kansas City
Plastiscines: myspace
Jaguar Love: website | myspace | Take Me to the Sea review | @ Trocadero, Philadelphia
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