popwreckoning

Rock Chalk Jayhawk! Kansas pride was running high at the Beaumont Club Sunday and it isn’t even the season for college sports. The occasion? A Panic! at the Disco concert.

The Kansas City club was packed with a surprisingly diverse group of crowd – yes, the expected screaming tween girls were there with their parents, but so were some young adults and many guys.

California’s Funeral Party opened the night with their brand of punk dance rock. Their songs are very anthem-structured. It’s easy to sing/cheer along and get revved up, especially on a tune such as “Finale.” Funeral Party has been getting some radio play in Kansas City and that seemed to help increase the amount of people singing along. The five band members seemed a little crammed on the stage with their many synths and guitars and the covered instruments of the bands to come. However, the cramped space didn’t stop singer Chad Elliott from bouncing around and dancing across any inch of stage left uncovered by equipment. These guys were a great warm-up for what was to come.

The next act up was the upbeat indie pop of New York’s fun – seriously – I’ve seen them perform in the form as a trio to the now six-piece. Fun. is a hodgepodge of some very talented musicians that you might recognize from their work with other bands. For example, in the trio that makes up the official members of fun., you might recognize the distinctive vocals of Nate Ruess from The Format, multi-instrumentalist Andrew Dost from Anthallo and guitarist Jack Antonoff from Steel Train. The touring members have an equally impressive history; drummer Will Noon‘s from Straylight Run. Finally, if you flash back to this post’s opening “Rock Chalk Jayhawk” cheer – I have to give a major shout out to Nate Harold. Harold was rocking a KU basketball jersey – but this wasn’t one of those gimmicks where the artist dons local paraphernalia just for the city’s show and then ditches it. Harold really does have ties to KU and KU’s home in Lawrence. Harold is a Lawrence musician. His music resume includes several Lawrence bands such as Buffalo Saints, Kelpie, Koufax and Big Surrender. He’s lent his talents to Get Up Kids‘ live shows and Hidden Pictures‘ latest album. As if that slew of Kansas bands wasn’t enough, he’s also known for his work with Waking Ashland. So it’s pretty exciting to this bassist on this national tour. Of course, Kansas City, is mostly in Missouri, so there are plenty of Mizzou fans that weren’t exactly the most thrilled with a KU shout out in the middle of the set. To keep things light-hearted, singer Ruess said he’d represent Missouri for that night. ‘Light-hearted’ is exactly how you could describe fun.’s music. Serious musicians with a light-hearted sound. Even when a song whose title and primary line is, “At least I’m not as sad as I used to be,” would give you pause to state aloud, when singing it there’s no doubt: you’re happy. There’s no way you could be sad listening to the bubbly piano-chords and singing “oh oh ooohs” on various fun. tunes. Lastly, I don’t want to end without mentioning how much I love the addition of Emily Moore on backing vocals and keys. She really adds a nice depth to the already flawless vocals of Ruess with her harmonies.

Now on to Panic! at the Disco – a band worth of having an exclamation in their name.

If you had asked me what I thought of the band when I first saw them perform in 2005 – ‘green,’ ‘pitchy,’ ‘eh’ would have been my reaction. They were excited, but not quite familiar with their instruments. They seemed a little nervous back then. By 2007 – I would have called them ‘too showy.’ It seemed like they were overcompensating with elaborate sets – at times it was impossible to even find the guys playing instruments amidst all the other skits happening on stage.

With this tour, they seem to have found that sweet spot between not overcompensating with an overdone stage set up and instead finding that confidence in their own talents as musicians. Don’t sweat if you liked a fancy stage piece – they still have a cool backdrop for this tour which was like Phantom of the Opera meets steampunk – (Phantom! of the Disco?). Eerie green lights highlighted organ pipes mountaining up from around the drum set. Fog billowed out from the pipes as our synth-organ-maestro Brendon Urie pounded out riffs on piano and guitar while the other original P!ATD member Spencer Smith dropped the beats that provided the backbone to the group’s many dance numbers.

Of course, as tickled as I was to see Brendon Urie display his ability to play multiple instruments (anyone remember back in ’05 when we weren’t even sure if he can play an instrument?), the real reason he makes the girls swoon is his voice. As I mentioned before, in ’05 I would have written Urie off – I found him unbelievably pitchy, but he really has been practicing training and now I see the charm of his vocals – a charm that really helps deliver songs such as  the hugeness of opening number “Ready to Go,” the subtle mood of “Lying Is the Most Fun” and the sweetness of “Always.” I love seeing a musician willing to work at their trade to improve – this is a job after all – so I really applaud Urie on how much he’s improved. I knew he had showmanship, but this tour really helps show that he also has musicianship. My only critique now is that when he can overuse vibrato, especially if a vocal is just a hair past his comfort level, but really his overall improvement makes that critique seem nitpicky.

Of course, Urie isn’t the only one who has done wonders impressing me over the years – drummer Spencer Smith – hot damn! I think because of that previously mentioned overdone stage set up a few years ago, the one that had Smith placed up on a platform 30 feet above the rest of the band – I had no idea how good this guy was. You couldn’t see him and you forgot to really listen to him in the melee of the theatrics. I’m so glad that they’ve taken him out of the shadows and placed him in better view because he should never go overlooked again. He packed some wicked syncopations into some of those numbers.

Now, for anyone who has been following P!ATD’s history, you’ll know that the band lost two of its members prior to this tour and their album. Joining Urie and Smith for the live performance were Ian Crawford (ex-The Cab) and Dallon Weekes. These guys did a great job keeping the sound full and complete, but I have to wonder if the line-up change was the reason for so few songs off of Pretty. Odd. It was expected that the band would play mostly off the latest release, but it did seem like Pretty. Odd was being neglected until toward the end of the set when they worked in two numbers. Of course, this is more of an observation – the fans still loved every minute of the set regardless.

Fun. wasn’t the only band that gave Kansas a big homage during their performance. P!ATD gave a special tribute of their own. When P!ATD returned for an encore, they treated everyone to a cover from rock group Kansas. It was a tight cover and you could see that many of the older crowd there really perked up with this addition. All these Kansas tributes made for a truly special night (but of course, you have to neglect that we were in Kansas City, Missouri).

P!ATD Set List:
Ready to Go
But It’s Better
Mona Lisa
Lying
Trade Mistakes
Camisado
Hurricane
Only Difference
Kill Tonight
Always
Nine
Things Have Changed
New Perspective
Calendar
Sins
//
Carry On (Kansas cover)
Nearly Witches

Florence Welch confounds me. No really, she does. I went and saw Florence and the Machine at the Showbox on Thursday, not knowing at all what to expect. I stood in line with everyone who bought their tickets before the intimate club at Pike’s Place Market sold out. To sell out on a Thursday is pretty impressive. But I guess it’s an attest to the magnificence of Florence and the Machine’s debut album, last year’s Lungs, which topped the British charts, but didn’t get quite the following on this side of the pond.

New York natives Holy Hail opened the show, just slightly after 9 p.m., with a keen and enjoyable set. It was clear that everyone was there to see Florence, so the crowd’s response to Holy Hail wasn’t the most enthusiastic, but they were good warm up. The band, fronted by Cat Hartwell, held their own for the anxious crowd, playing songs off their 2008 album Independent Pleasure Club, and their other various EPs, as well as some new ones. “Riverine” stuck out to me, like a truly New Yorkian indie record, but with a hint of old west swagger. They graciously thanked the crowd for coming out that night, and Florence for taking them on tour, and stepped off stage at about 9:30. But that’s just a guess-timation.

After nearly an hour-long wait of reggae and old jazz playing on the loudspeakers, The Machine took the stage to some intense mood lighting, making way for Florence Welch’s grand entrance, starting off with a wicked version of “Howl.” She swayed around the stage, dressed in a lace afghan and blouse to match. Her blazing red hair glowed beneath the blue and yellow lights of the Showbox, and the crowd sang along right with her.

Why does Florence Welch confound me? Her performance persona is big and loud and powerful and grandiose, but her personality between songs could be described as nothing less than adorable. After a couple songs, she decided to go barefoot. She slipped off her heels and hopped around the stage before stepping back up to the mic. At that point the microphone sat right about at her eye level, and Florence declared, “I’m tiny.” To avoid sounding incredibly cliché, I’ll just let the irony of that statement sink in for now.

After singing her face off with “Between Two Lungs,” she grabbed a red plastic cup and straw and sipped it politely. Then she proceeded to explain that every time she gets one of those plastic cups, she gets, dare I say, a little tipsy. And then she giggled and said a quiet “Thank you, Seattle,” and introduced the next song. All the songs Florence played that night were off of Lungs, but “Hardest of Hearts” was the only one off the deluxe edition of the album. I happen to own the deluxe edition, so I was completely familiar with all the songs played that night. Evidently, everyone else knew the songs as well, because you couldn’t look around at any point and not see someone singing along with Florence

Seeing these songs live deepened my love for them, especially “Drumming Song” and “Cosmic Love,” where Florence beat on her own floor tom along with her band and let out this not-so-tiny (there’s the irony!) voice. Then in a haunting version of “Blinding,” one light backlit Florence while she wrapped herself up in the afghan like a child pretending to be ghost, and just like the song, Florence’s performance escalated into a powerful spectacle of awesome proportions.

Florence’s attitude while singing juxtaposed with her sweet disposition made the show all that more entertaining, because it proves how talented she really is. Her songs are epic and sexy, but she’s not a pretentious diva at all. She repeatedly thanked Seattle in her charming London accent and paused between songs to give her keyboard player a big hug. I couldn’t help but love her. I kind of wanted to be her best friend at that point.

The last song before the encore was – of course – “Dog Days are Over,” where everyone on the club instantly started dancing and singing along. I honestly feared for the life of my camera for a bit there, but it was so much fun. This one guy standing in front of me – who was about 5 inches taller than me – was absolutely nuts about Florence, as he started the clap-along before the encore at just about 11:30. A few minutes of badly timed “Florence! Florence! Florence!” later, Florence and her Machine walked back on stage. Acknowledged the energy of the crowd, she asked us – on this next song – to jump even more than we had been.

As I expected, they went right into “Kiss With a Fist,” which again sent the crowd into frenzy. We calmed down just a little after the short and energetic “Kiss With a Fist,” and Florence made one last request of us for “Rabbit Heart (Raise It Up).” “When I do this,” and she shot her fist up in the air, “then you shout ‘raise it up!’” It was kind of magical how well it worked, because just like she asked, everyone not only shouted “raise it up,” but also shot their fists up in the air along with her.

Florence graciously bowed and thanked Seattle one last time before she and her band left the stage, and told everyone, “I’d love to come back if you’d have me.” The guy in front of me shouted, “We’d love to have you back!”

After that show, I was not opposed to the idea.

Set List:
1.   Howl
2.   My Boy Builds Coffins
3.   Hurricane Drunk
4.   Between Two Lungs
5.   Hardest Of Hearts
6.   Drumming Song
7.   Cosmic Love
8.   I’m Not Calling You A Liar
9.   Blinding
10.   You’ve Got the Love
11.   Dog Days Are Over

Encore
12.   Kiss With a Fist
13.   Rabbit Heart (Raise It Up)

On the first of two shows in Seattle, Spoon filled the Moore Theater Friday night with fans, fun and a fantastic lineup. I entered the theater after I inexplicably acquired two after-show passes and took a seat up towards the front for the openers. In fact, I didn’t actually take my assigned seat until Spoon started their set.

The theater was virtually vacant for the first act, Micachu and the Shapes, who pushed through their eccentric set of songs laced with cowbells and bottle percussion, as well as some insistent feedback ringing from the front speakers. They acknowledged it at one point – “Sorry for the buzzing.” And someone shouted from the audience – “Keep playing and we won’t hear it!” Micachu and the Shapes was far more experimental than the two bands that followed, but it does suck that they didn’t get a better crowd. I quite liked “Vulture,” as its ambient sound almost made sense with the buzzing feedback. But it was an early door time. People didn’t feel like getting an early dinner before the doors opened at 6:30. My dinner consisted of a maple bar, so I had no trouble making the opening bands.

After Micachu finished their set, there was a short turnover time before more photographers started showing up for Deerhunter. At this point, the number of attendees in the theater grew by quite a bit. Now that I’ve seen the show, I feel bad for everyone who didn’t make it to see Deerhunter, because they were so good they didn’t feel like openers at all. Singer Bradford Cox and the gang came out on stage, and awestruck by the size of the theater or something else, proclaimed “what the fuck is going on?” This turned out to be a theme throughout their show – disbelief. I almost felt like a terrible person for not being familiar with their music before this show, but I’m surely familiar with them now.

The set was so casual, with Deerhunter tripping across the stage, breaking out into laughter at times, and during “Nothing Ever Happens,” a friend of band jumped up on stage and shimmied around with maracas. She crawled on the floor underneath Cox’s legs as he played and she licked the guitar strings, climbed on the drums and leapt around the stage, stumbling into every band member. All of this culminated into a long, drawn-out version of  “Calvary Scars,” where Cox exclaimed how surreal it was to be twenty-seven in Seattle at the anniversary of Kurt Cobain’s death. “I’ll never be 27!” he repeated several times, as he waxed poetic about his twelve-year-old self, his own contemplation of suicide, and his unbelievable dream of his dead idol coming down from heaven to take vengeance on all the high school bullies. The whole thing was magical and felt completely personal, like we’d never see the same show again.

By this time, the Moore Theater was basically full. I didn’t have the luxury of sitting in an empty seat up front after I was finished shooting. But I didn’t care. I could have been on the second mezzanine and it still would have been amazing. I caught a glimpse of the set list, and it was huge. I knew we’d be there for awhile, rocking out to a smorgasbord of Spoon.

It was a hodgepodge of old and new stuff. Spoon played most of Transference, some select favorites from Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga, but a lot of Gimme Fiction. In fact, during “I Turn My Camera On,” I could see another of the photographers making frames with her hands up to her face. You could surely tell that the audience was full of new and old fans of Spoon. They have been around for about 15 years now, so it was to be expected that there would be fans mix age and below as well as fans my parents’ age.

They jumped right into their two hour-set with “Before Destruction” off Transference and moved swiftly into more of my favorites. The intimate, dome-shaped Moore Theater glowed with the spotlights reflecting off the walls, revealing the joyous faces of the audience. Britt planted his feet – clad in leather ankle boots – on the stage, strumming the notes of “The Underdog” on his guitar. The instant familiarity sent the audience into an indie rock dance party, even my fellow photographers. I can them on the other side of the stage bopping around with their cameras like silly fangirls at a Jonas Brothers concert.

The crowd swayed back and forth along to Britt Daniel’s flawless delivery, switching from his easy raspy tone to a powerful cry during each song. The one omission from the show that peeved me was “Got Nuffin.” It was nowhere to be found. It turns out that they played it the next night instead of Friday. I wanted “Got Nuffin,” but what I got was so amazing that I didn’t even care at the time.

Spoon also implored some friendly faces to play with them during the show. Seattle’s own Michael Lerner, a.k.a. Telekinesis played snare on a select few songs, and Cox stepped back out to play when Daniel just crooned into the mic without his guitar. When Cox walked on stage with a snowcap on, Daniel swung his guitar off his shoulder and handed it to him. Keyboardist Eric Harvey played the cool and sexy opening riffs of “Who Makes Your Money” and Daniel sauntered around the stage singing his “oh, oh, ooos” to the audience directly in front. He threw his head back and shouted the hook while Bradford snuck up behind him and thrust the neck of his guitar between Daniel’s legs. He stared down at his groin and continued crooning, “who makes your money? Who makes you money?” then shoved Cox back playfully as the audience giggled along with them. Soon after, Daniel set down his guitar and jumped into the crowd to wake up the one guy who wasn’t on his feet. Really, the guy was sleeping.

Taking a trip through oldies-but-goodies, I was completely satisfied with my Spoon experience. Even though I was hoping to hear “Got Nuffin,” I left on a pleasant note, as the finished on an high note with one of my favorite Spoon songs, “Jonathan Fisk.” And more dancing ensued. I loved the show’s friendly environment. It was awesome. If the security guards hadn’t been walking up and down the aisles making sure people stayed out of them, I’m pretty sure people would have started dancing with each other during several of the songs right down the aisles. As the show finished at about 11:30, I almost wanted to get tickets to Saturday’s show just to extend the greatness that I’d just experienced for another day, but I had work to do the next day. But I think if I’d seen Spoon two days in a row, I may have overdosed on awesome.

Finding myself in Seattle on a night before I have a seven page paper due is not a common thing, but on this particular Tuesday, I ventured to Neumos in Capitol Hill to see Scottish band We Were Promised Jetpacks, accompanied by local sweetheart band The Lonely Forest and Bear Hands of Brooklyn.
I hadn’t been to Neumos in a good two years, so I forgot how intimate the venue was.  But it was quite obvious that a majority of the 16-year-old girls and boys were there to see The Lonely Forest, and the older crowd came out for We Were Promised Jetpacks, but Bear Hands held their own, truly being the opener.

They played songs off their debut EP Golden, as well as their second EP, What a Drag, released last month. “Can’t Stick Em” from the latter EP was my favorite of their set, with a driving tempo and vocalist Dylan Rau building from the softer harmonies at the beginning to getting stronger and louder to meet the gritty guitar riff. Actually listening back to it now, Rau’s voice reminds me a little of David Portner of Animal Collective, how it teeters on the edge of notes. So if you like fuzzed out guitars and multi-layered harmonies, check Bear Hands out.

After Bear hands finished their set, it was close to 10, so the anticipation for Lonely Forest got to build for 20 minutes. Surrounded by crazy fangirls and one even crazier fanboy, I filtered through my pictures from the last hour. Then at about 10:15, The Lonely Forest got on the tiny stage and immediately thanked the all-ages crowd. Playing a selection from last year’s debut critically acclaimed We Sing the Body Electric, as well as some new songs, The Lonely Forest kept the energy going throughout their set. By the 3^rd song, front man John Van Deusen was already sweating profusely from his temples, switching from keyboard to guitar. It’s just a testament to how passionate this band is about their music and about their fans. And it doesn’t hurt that they’re great musicians too. The Lonely Forest closed out their set with “We Sing In Time,” which made the whole room sing a long, especially the crazy fangirls standing up front with me.

I liked what I heard of the new songs, and they were more upbeat and sunnier than We Sing The Body Electric, but I didn’t grab the set list, so I have no idea what the titles were. Just keep your eyes peeled for their new songs, and possibly a new album in 2010.

By 11:20, my feet were sufficiently aching. Every so often when the security opened the side door the gust of wind provided a sudden bit of relief from hot and sweaty venue. After a very long intro of “A Half-Built House,” with dozens of loops of the same voice repeating numbers, We Were Promised Jetpacks finally came on stage and dove into “Keeping Warm” off These Four Walls. I haven’t been listening to We Were Promised Jetpacks for long, but I loved how casual they were. The four guys just walked up on stage and started playing. No grandiose entrance or anything, and they were awesome. It could be my bias for UK bands, but for some reason, the Scottish accent makes all songs sound so much cooler.

After the first few songs I made my way out of the crowded front to get some water, and I noticed that the crowd had completely changed. The young fans that came to see The Lonely Forest had dissipated and most of the people I weaved through were older, who’d come to see We Were Promised Jetpacks. It was almost midnight, so that could be why, since it was a school night. And still as I stood off to the side, We Were Promised Jetpacks had the same impact in this tiny venue as if I standing right up front.

Bravo, Scotsmen. Bravo.