So I thought it was about time I got my ageing indie kid on again, and took myself out to a gig. I think the last band I went to see was The Jackfields in DC back in 2004, so I’ve been keeping my eye on the local gig listings to see if anyone interesting was coming to H-Town. When I saw that Silversun Pickups were passing through, I was a bit apprehensive. I loved their first album, Carnavas, but each successive album has been harder to love at first listen. What drew me to Silversun Pickups was the sense of nervous panic that permeates their early tunes (Future Foe Scenarios, Chequered Floor, Dream At Tempo 119), and their latest album, Better Nature, veers a bit too far from that feeling, being downright cheerful in places. That said it does have its moments, and all of their albums have actually grown on me over time, so I figured this one may do the same if I heard it live. And then I noticed that the support band was Foals, who I’ve been a fan of since Total Life Forever, and I’d been hoping that they would tour through here supporting their latest excellent album, What Went Down anyway. Add to that a second support band, Joywave, who I’ve heard some OK-ish stuff from on Sirius XMU, and I figured it was worth the $35 ticket price (plus another $15 ‘convenience fee’, plus $10 parking…).
So on Monday (a school night! this is as close as I get to a wild time these days…) I trudged my way down to the Revention Center, and lined up with the rest of the indie kids, for the privilege of being frisked on my way in, and paying $10 for two small cans of Red Bull to keep me awake past my usual bedtime. I’ve long recognized that I’m in the ‘elder minority’ at gigs, so this time I decided to just accept my age and buy a seated ticket, as opposed to trying my luck in the general admission pit. Don’t get me wrong, I much prefer being in the pit (where being tall is a distinct advantage), but I always come away with backache and sore feet, and as all tickets were the same price (with the exception of the ‘VIP booths’ – lord knows how much they were), I figured I may as well get value for money.
Joywave were alright… The vocalist – Daniel Armbruster – played the nerd card very heavily, with oversize glasses and wearing skinny jeans and a blindingly white baseball jacket, but he seemed to be trying too hard to be all ‘ironic’, putting in a pretty tongue-in-cheek performance (reinforced by the backdrop announcing “Due to unforeseen circumstances Joywave are not headlining tonight’s concert”) when he certainly has the vocal chops to carry the music seriously. If only he’d stop slapping his chest and pulling his hair, which was just distracting… But for sheer enthusiasm he was no match for the keyboardist though, who did as much jumping around as is humanly possible when you have to keep your hands in largely the same place. Very entertaining. I can’t say I actually recognized anything Joywave played – not even their last song, which I guess I should have done as Armbruster helpfully introduced it as “the greatest song ever written” – but I was hugely impressed with their energetic high point Somebody New. I know what it was called as I was impressed enough to take time out of nodding sagely in approval to SoundHound it (and surprisingly, SoundHound recognized it straight away – so maybe it has better ears than I do, now).
Prior to the second band of the evening, Foals, taking the stage we were treated to an intro tape of Viet Cong‘s Death, which seemed a bit heavy for a band whose basic musical template seems to be Chant No 1. (I Don’t Need This Pressure On) by Spandau Ballet (you compare that to the first half of Total Life Forever and tell me I’m wrong), but that segued perfectly into Foals bouncing onto the stage and hammering out (I think) Providence from Holy Fire, and we were in business. Foals may have been the support band (at least tonight), but they came on like they were headlining, powering through all the heavier numbers in their repertoire, barely taking the time to come up for air. Although the highlight for me personally was not any of the songs, but vocalist Yannis giving away his Englishness by announcing, after a particularly energetic run through What Went Down, “That was brilliant!”, which no doubt confused the Texan audience who have probably never heard the word ‘brilliant’ used to describe anything other than rhinestones and diamonds. But indeed, brilliant it was!
After the obligatory slow segment, led by Spanish Sahara, Foals cranked things up again, accelerating into their recent single Mountain At My Gate, which features my favorite 30 seconds of Foals ever, in the outtro. It was all hugely energetic, with just about the whole crowd jumping along – even those of us in the seat-bound sections. I was beginning to wonder how headliners Silversun Pickups could possibly follow Foals, who were just destroying it, but then Foals raised the bar even higher by closing with a punishing version of Inhaler from Holy Fire, which just blew me away. And suddenly the choice of Viet Cong for the intro tape made total sense; these Oxford boys can seriously rock!
The downside to this, though, is that when Silversun Pickups finally took to the stage, it felt like a come-down after Foals. For some reason the volume was noticeably lower, and the mix was so bad that Brian Aubert’s lead guitar was reduced to a fuzzy, indeterminate mush. It took them until their third number, a cracking The Royal We, to get the sound right, and even then they never really matched Foals for energy and intensity – just volume. That’s not to say it wasn’t a great show – it was actually better than I’d expected, and definitely worth the price of admission. The band played a decent selection of songs from all four of their albums, although the set did lean heavily on their most recent album, Better Nature – which I guess is inevitable as that’s what they are touring to support. And despite my initial reservations, the songs on Better Nature did hold up well to a live setting, and hearing a good chunk of the audience singing back “I want it!” during the chorus of album opener Cradle (Better Nature) was one of the high points of the night.
For a very un-rock-n-roll-looking guy, vocalist/guitarist Brian Aubert turned out to be a pretty entertaining frontman – and generous too, with plenty of praise for both of the support bands. When it came to bassist Nikki’s ‘big vocal number’ of Circadian Rhythm (Last Dance) (where she takes the lead instead of just providing backing vocals) Aubert pointed out that it always made her nervous, so the best thing to do was for everyone to just stare at her, and had the spots focussed solely on her, just to add to the pressure. And during Panic Switch when she hits the repeating bass phrase, he left her playing on her own for waaaay longer than the album version, just standing there laughing as she fought to keep it going, before bringing the rest of the band back in. But she never wavered, bless her, which garnered some appreciative cheers from the crowd.
The biggest cheers of the night clearly went to songs from Carnavas, especially for Lazy Eye, which is probably about as close to a ‘hit single’ as Silversun Pickups are likely to enjoy, buoyed by its inclusion in Rock Band. But in a piece of bad planning, SSPU chose to close their main set with it, which prompted a good chunk of the audience to leave once they had heard it (presumably reasoning that once you have heard the hit single you can check the ‘Seen’ box and move on), instead of waiting around for the inevitable encore. Which was certainly their loss, as Silversun Pickups slipped a blistering Panic Switch into the three-song encore, which almost (almost) wrested the performance of the night back from Foals.
Last time I saw Silversun Pickups was when they supported Muse a few years back – then I went for the support act and stayed for the headliners basically because I’d already paid, and they were effectively a free bonus band (and for the record, SSPU were better…). This time Silversun Pickups were the headliners, and I had considered Foals the bonus band. But what a bonus! I’m now looking forward to catching Foals when they come back through H-Town, as headliners.
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