Jane Scott, the legendary journalist who covered four decades of rock ‘n’ roll for The Plain Dealer, died early Monday after a long illness. She was 92. Funeral arrangements are being handled by Busch Funeral Home of Fairview Park. A memorial service will be held at a later date in Cleveland.

Her byline appeared in the newspaper thousands of times, above music features, concert reviews and her long-running “What’s Happening” column in Friday! magazine.

More here…

For a music blog that has long prided itself on being true to “indie rock, metal & comedy”, we were amused to see Brooklynvegan.com going out of their way to promote Converse with not only a “Free Music Day” co-presenting slot, but going so far as to say that “Converse is doing a lot lately to help support music, and has especially hooked up Brooklyn.”

The idea of a corporation using artists and bands to market their products is certainly nothing new, but for a music blog that stakes it’s claim on “indie” music coverage to fall for a basic corporate PR stunt (along with the NY Times Music Section), not only falls far short of music journalistic standards, but when you tie it in with perhaps the ugliest flyer in creation? Pathetic.

Thanks to a PR piece in the NY Times, (which BrooklynVegan also linked to in their piece), Converse has been using money to open a recording studio in Williamsburg, Brooklyn to “let bands record for free”. A great idea right?

Sure! But given the readily-available recording software and numerous independent studios already operating all over Brooklyn, Manhattan and elsewhere, this idea, while a nice concept, is about seven years too late. The mastermind behind this “ground breaking idea” is Geoff Cottrill, the company’s chief marketing officer. In the NY Times piece, they describe Cottrill as “sporting a pair of ripped jeans, a Rolex watch and a big, I-swear-it’s-true smile” as he described the plans for the studio, which is to open by the end of the year.” The irony of a Rolex sporting CMO cruising around Williamsburg in ripped jeans plugging a recording studio wasn’t lost on us either.

While Brooklyn Vegan described this as an “incredible hook up” to the local musicians in Williamsburg desperate to record their music with some hot-shot engineers on the Converse dime, it’s all-too-convenient to forget that Nike (the parent company of Converse)l, rakes in over $19 Billion per year largely by exploiting third world countries for not only labor but for obvious profit margins to actively market their products. The fact that Converse decided to spend a fraction of their typical ad-buy on a recording studio in the heart of hipsterville is not only a joke, but maybe it’s proof that music blogs (operating under the guise of journalism standards) should open their eyes to the bigger picture of what constitutes a corporation trying to move product, versus a genuine non-profit support of the arts.

In the latest controversy that’s been dominating the entertainment wires, the rock legend Lou Reed was widely reported to turn down Susan Boyle’s request to cover his song “Perfect Day” (off his 1972 album Transformer) on the America’s Got Talent program.

TMZ picked up the story and reported that Boyle “flew back to London in tears” upon hearing this news of Reed’s refusal, and since then Reed’s reps have been backpedaling and claiming it was last minute red tape and that the song was “only cleared for use in her native UK, not in the US.” Show creator Simon Cowell has since entered the fray, branding Reed’s behavior “petty” and “pathetic” recently in an interview on the BBC.

Whether you’re for or against Reed’s reported decision, there’s several reasons in Reed’s defense that must be acknowledged as to why he, the composer of the original material, has every right to tell Simon Cowell, Susan Boyle, and America’s Got Talent to “take a hike” – (or as Reed once sang in his live version of “Heroin” from his live album Rock & Roll Animal ) “you can all go take a f***ing walk!”

1. It’s his song.
That’s right! If you – the artist – compose a song from the ground up, and you don’t want to see your song performed live on a TV program, in a commercial, or featured in a film – that’s your right since you composed the song. Regardless of the reasons, it’s your song, and you (as the artist) can do as you like with it. One of the benefits of composing your own material to perform!

2. Songs are personal – and not necessarily about profit, right?
Reed first composed this song in late 1971, and the only times this song HAS been covered by high profile artists, it was notably for charity (as a recent UK charity-single featuring David Bowie and an all-star cast covering “Perfect Day” proved), OR when he decided to accompany the artist (as he did with Luciano Pavoratti) back in 2001 (which can be seen here…) Charity or personal accompaniment aside, Simon Cowell doesn’t have a leg to stand on when he’s claiming loads of artists have covered this song…Yes they have Simon, but Reed’s obviously put charity performances first and foremost in the considerations, and he can veto your requests (or Ms Boyle’s). That’s his right as the composer of the original material.

3. Maybe Lou Reed doesn’t wish to endorse America’s Got Talent?
Perhaps Lou Reed doesn’t want one of his treasured songs being used as an advertising vehicle for a potential fly-by-night TV show that he’s likely not a fan of? We can guess Lou Reed likely isn’t glued to his television set waiting for the next episode of America’s Got Talent, and it’s his 100% given-right as the composer of the material to say “You know what? I think your show is awful – please don’t use my material for it.” Some artists are willing to sell their songs to commercials and let their material appear on shows for a share of the royalties. Reed has always been sensitive on this subject and we can guess he holds this particular song in high regard – maybe he doesn’t want to tarnish or (some might say) “cheapen” the song? This reason can also be titled “artistic integrity”.

4. Maybe he really ISN’T a fan of Susan Boyle?
Stop the press! Maybe Reed wasn’t as boiled over as the rest of the country when Boyle came out and sang “I Dreamed a Dream” on Britain’s Got Talent? Reed’s reasoning for turning down Boyle might be awfully similar to why The Cure had turned down Paul Young back in the mid-80’s when Young approached the UK band about covering their song Boys Don’t Cry. (As recounted in A Visual Documentary by Paul Thompson.) When The Cure’s vocalist Robert Smith was asked about this “snub” by a reporter, he responded: “[Young] asked us for our blessing but I said “no” – I couldn’t imagine anything worse….”. However, Young’s fortunes changed when Daryl Hall had given him permission to cover one of his lesser-known songs “Every Time You Go Away” in 1985, and the song ended up becoming Young’s sole monster-Top Ten hit song in the US. Maybe Susan Boyle might benefit from this current fall-out by accepting song donations by other artists, in lieu of writing her own?

5. He’s Lou Reed
His artistic contributions to rock need no introduction. His musical-genre-inventing work with The Velvet Underground landed him critical praise, and legions of rock musicians have since cited Reed as an “influence”. Reed can do whatever he damn well pleases, and he always has for the past 40 years and this stance has kept Reed still going strong. While many other sixties musicians are either dead & buried, or re-generating the same material over and over again, Reed’s latest recordings have been arguably experimental and “new”. His artistic stance has served him well to this day, why should he be forced to change it now?

Unless Reed comes out and permits Boyle to cover the song, or he helps iron out whatever behind-the-scenes snaffoo his reps have been belatedly claiming, the legions of upset Susan Boyle fans might do themselves a favor and remember that the world doesn’t revolve around their dearest Susan, and that she might be better off seeking material elsewhere or dare we say – compose her own to perform on the program.

If any lesson is to be learned from this debate, maybe Simon Cowell and the rest of the entertainment industry might recognize the value in artists that write & perform their own material live – as opposed to artists that strictly depend on others for their own artistic stabilities – or lackthereof. – Dennis Tyhacz

The musician David Byrne has written a great two part series in which is discusses the end of newspapers, and for a musician, it’s a shame he’s not testifing in front of congress about the decline of “investigative journalism” in this country, because he has a better grasp of the issue then even some politicians like John Kerry. From his article:

“We’ve seen way too many articles recently about newspapers in financial trouble: closing bureaus, cutting back on commissioned pieces that require in-depth reporting, and erecting paywalls for their online editions in an attempt to reverse the exodus of subscribers expecting to get all their news for free.

While the physical print model of news journals might disappear relatively soon — which will instantly eliminate any such news source from the 1/5 of Americans who rarely use or have access to the Internet, and don’t use smart phones — it doesn’t mean that what they do also needs to end. As the future of these institutions seems increasingly in peril, I recently began to notice some of the incredibly important things they do and have done.”

Read Part I Here
Part II is here…

by Christien Lauro

I always feel out of place at Radio City Music Hall. Whenever I’m inside gawking at the opulent art deco interior, I think that any moment a large usher is going to tell me I have to leave because I’m not wearing a tie. But I dutifully showed up, along with several thousand other fans to see Jason Pierce lead his band Spiritualized plus an orchestra and choir in a performance of his classic Ladies and Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space LP last Friday night at said venerable venue. If there is any modern album that actually deserves to be performed in its entirety at Radio City Music Hall with a string octet, a horn sextet, a white-gowned gospel choir, and a percussionist augmenting a six-piece rock band, it is definitely Ladies and Gentlemen…

After a late start, a mirror ball mishap and Kate Radley’s sampled voice introducing the album’s opening title track, the curtain finally rose over a stage crowded with musicians and equipment and a dazzling light show which included a backdrop made to look like the stars in deep space and harsh LED strobe lights (and let’s not forget the requisite dry iced smoke). It was impossible not to be awed by the visual spectacle but that was nothing compared to the dense layers of sound created by the dozens of musicians. Not content to simply play the album, Pierce rearranged most of the songs and utilized all the available musicians to maximum effect. For anyone familiar with the original album there were some unique surprises (a harmonica vs. gospel choir dueling solo during “No God Only Religion” being one stand out), some amazing arrangements (the choir overtaking the rest of the musicians on “Home of the Brave”), some especially captivating performances (“I Think I’m In Love”, “Broken Heart”, “Cool Waves”) and a great many moments where musicians and audience were blasted en masse into the furthest reaches of outer space (all the Varèse meets “Sister Ray” instrumental jams on “The Individual”, “No God…” and “Cop Shoot Cop”).

At times the effect of the very loud instrumental rumble coupled with the seizure-inducing LED strobe lights was nauseating – particularly when someone in the audience decided to blaze a joint during “The Individual”. But an album so steeped in heartbreak, drug addiction and ultimately the healing powers of rock and roll is bound to be a bit messy for performer and audience alike. There were certainly moments of blissful transcendence as well (the horn and choir breakdown on “Come Together”, the buildup of “Stay With Me”, the languid opening of “I Think I’m In Love”). After nearly an hour and a half of pummeling the audiences’ eyes and ears, the band received a well-deserved standing ovation at the end of the absolutely epic cacophony of album closer, “Cop Shoot Cop” and quickly returned to the stage for a brief encore.

They opened the encore with an amazing arrangement of “Out of Sight” from the 2001 LP, Let It Come Down. This became a unexpected highlight of the show as the band really blasted into the stratosphere with horns blazing, string players sawing away, guitarists rocking out with tremolos raging, wailing harmonica and full on choir back up for Pierce’s unusually impassioned vocals (coupled with the extraterrestrial lighting effects) all working together to add a lush and powerful explosion of sound and emotion to the originally more spare composition. And just when you thought they couldn’t top all that had gone before, they perfectly ended the evening with a gorgeous, Velvet Underground goes to church rendition of the Edwin Hawkins Singers staple “Oh Happy Day” (hey why let a perfectly good white-gowned gospel choir go to waste?).

The musicians received another standing ovation and as the house lights came up bringing everyone back down to Earth, I left feeling exhausted and exhilarated (as well as half deaf and blind), knowing I had just seen one hell of a show, in every sense of the word. Really that should’ve been enough to keep me going for quite a while but the following afternoon I made my way to Damrosch Park in Lincoln Center just as the MC was announcing the start of the second half of the Ponderosa Stomp: The Detroit Breakdown show. I found a seat as Death began their set of dirty rock smack downs. While the influence of bands like The Stooges and the MC5 was obvious, their music sounded more avant than proto punk.

As they performed “Politicians In My Eyes”, it occurred to me that the song could have easily been written yesterday rather than 35 years ago and it’s about the fear of being drafted for the Vietnam war! I couldn’t help thinking that if you sped them up a bit you’d have a more soulful Dead Kennedys or perhaps a less dubby Bad Brains and while I could see why they didn’t quite catch on back then it is sad to think it took over thirty years for them to get a measure of respect and recognition. Luckily Drag City has begun the process of saving them from obscurity by giving their old recordings wide release. I was impressed with their songs and their playing but many of the elderly people and weekending tourists in attendance seemed confused, dismayed and perhaps a little offended. I guess that is what you get when you schedule a band called Death to play outside in the middle of Lincoln Center at 5:00 pm on a Saturday!

Next up was newly reformed, The Gories, with their patented brand of fuzzy minimalist mayhem. They put up a brave front of thoroughly enjoying themselves given the acrimony that surrounded their dissolution and still seems to hang about them. But really, it would be very hard to deny the unmitigated pleasure of listening to their exuberantly primitive caterwauling. They definitely know how to put on an energetic show too as evidenced by Mick Collins jumping up and down on his amp until both he and the amp spilled over onto the stage. While they might not be particularly polished musicians (and really that is being kind) they are a lot of fun and seem to inspire an almost adolescent joy in their fans, many of whom jumped and danced around the park for their entire set (much to the dour disproval of the old folks who left in droves during their performance).

This enthusiasm could become a bit misguided as in the case of one overzealous fan that brought along his own tambourine and attempted to play along with Peg O’Neill’s barely competent drum beats. This created a rather annoying arrhythmic echo effect that was impossible to ignore and grew more pronounced as the set went on. Despite that, watching The Gories was a total blast; I especially enjoyed their interesting take on Suicide’s “Ghost Rider”! Following them was ? and the Mysterians and I truly wanted to see them play their signature hit “96 Tears” but I had to rush home to feed and walk the dog and then head into the heart of chooch darkness (the lower east side on a Saturday night) to see the triumphant return of Arab on Radar after an almost decade long hiatus.

I waded through pustulant wanker choked Ludlow Street to the Cake Shop and entered the dank, hot basement club just after Oakland, CA septet, No Babies, took the stage…and the floor. It’s a safe bet that even if the puny stage at Cake Shop was big enough to hold all the members of the band and their equipment, it could never have contained their manic performance. Their sound was akin to God Is My Co-Pilot playing The Feeding of the 5000 and Trout Mask Replica simultaneously while mainlining pixy stix. They were certainly a sight to behold as all members except the two drummers spent most of their time jumping spasmodically around in the audience (in tight bicycle shorts which appeared to be their band uniform) while somehow still managing to play their instruments. Singer, Kimya Lindale, spent so much time running around in the audience that it took me until almost the end of their set to realize that she was actually in the band; I mistook her for a rabid fan! After their all too brief set, local noise trio, Child Abuse, treated the sticky audience to forty-five minutes of standing around waiting for them to set up. When they finally finished abusing the crowd’s patience and began abusing their instruments, they filled the miniscule space with enough ugly sounds for several Cake Shops. Their lurching, mean-spirited music sounded like Sam McPheeters singing for the Jesus Lizard ass raping Suicide. While enjoy might be a strong word, I did appreciate what they were doing musically and their performance had a certain charming entertainment value. The highlight of their set was watching front man, Luke Calzonetti, spit a giant glob of saliva onto the ceiling. The goo proceeded to slowly ooze back down from the low ceiling like a malevolent, saliva stalactite, which came dangerously close to dripping on his mangled Casio keyboard. He swung his arm around, grabbing the menacing globule from midair just as it was about to detach itself and land on his instrument and then shoved it back into his mouth and gleefully swallowed. After Child Abuse’s performance that lasted half as long as their set-up, it was finally time for those lovable scamps from Arab on Radar to take the stage.

Arab on Radar

And take it they did, running out onto the tiny stage in their creepy proletariat band uniforms (black button down shirts and black slacks) and without so much as a ‘hello Cleveland’ ripped into an unrelenting forty minutes of macho, sexually inappropriate, vaguely homoerotic, aggro sonic Armageddon. The guitars were serrated chromatic blades carving away at the ear canal and the drums a furious, rumbling tribal tattoo, which created a skuzzy, tight fisted noisescape for anti-charismatic front man, Eric Paul (aka Mr. Pottymouth) to shock and amaze and spew forth his orifice obsessed lyrics. In the eight years that AOR has been dormant, Paul, has lost none of his disturbing ability to completely unnerve. He flopped around the stage in a disgusting pantomime of mental derangement screeching horrifically absurd lyrics as if he were a Thalidomide baby trapped in the body of the elderly Marquis de Sade. The band brought their own light show – harsh bare bulbs pointed at the audience and as they started playing the crowd erupted into a seething mess of sweaty, contorted silhouettes. The lights and the pit made the already insufferably hot and dingy atmosphere in the basement impenetrably claustrophobic. One song bled into another without a break and hardly a word from Paul, although at one point he did punctuate a rare half-minute of silence in between songs with what sounded like the wail of a tongueless child screaming, “I used to get hiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiigggghhhhhhhh!” (as he wriggled and flopped around the stage I thought to myself ‘used to’?) but it was unclear if this was a song title or simply an instance of over sharing on his part. If there ever was a case for recommending behavior modification through copious amounts of medication it would be Paul (as an interesting side note: he is one of only two people I have ever seen horrify an entire audience simply by reading from a book – in Paul’s case from his whimsically perverse, I Offered Myself As The Sea). He is an unhinged parody of a rock front man, sort of like the Anti-Mick Jagger.

The rest of the band was almost as entertaining to watch as Paul. Drummer, Craig Kureck, augmented his band uniform by wrapping himself in the bright red Christmas tree tinsel hanging over the back of the stage and as each song finished he would leap up from his stool, frantically wave his arms in the air for a few seconds sending tinsel shooting in every direction and then sit back down and start pounding out the next song. Guitarists, Steve Mattos and Jeff Schneider, jerked around the stage strangling their guitar necks as if they were offending priapic members. As they finished their set the crowd screamed for more even though the air in the room felt like hot wet wool wrapped around your entire body. The band returned to the stage after only a minute and Paul launched into a brief rant about NYC bands stealing Providence bands’ ideas which was by far the most he spoke during the entire show. They played two more twisted tunes, causing the crowd to begin writhing around with renewed energy. When the show ended, I couldn’t get out of that room fast enough. The putridly humid early August morning air felt like a cool ocean breeze after the confines of the Cake Shop. Of course I had to wade through the chooch apocalypse which had doubled and gotten more liquored up during the time I was inside.

One would think that I would’ve spent Sunday sleeping off my music binge but I capped off my rock and roll weekend by going to see Ken Russell’s cruelly anarchic film, The Devils, at the Walter Reade Theater in Lincoln Center. And, lest you think this was a more relaxing pursuit, rest assured that at certain points the film was both louder and more violently disturbing than anything I had seen or heard in the previous two days, but that is an entirely different story.

For More on all of the above artists:

No Babies

Child Abuse

Arab On Radar

More links soon!

Show review by Christien Lauro

Modern English know what their audience wants and they have no qualms about giving it to them. If the mostly reformed original 80’s line up wasn’t enough of a clue then the merchandise table made it pretty obvious; it offered the choice of their first three albums which span the years 1981-1984 (plus their new album) and one t-shirt design with the cover art for the original “I Melt With You” single emblazoned on it.

Most of the band members seem to have aged well, certainly better than some of their music. Energetic front man, Robbie Grey, comically announced they had just come from Toronto with broken keyboards and broken equipment as broken men. But they looked pretty healthy and happy as they ripped through beefy and very loud, rock oriented versions of classic tracks from their first three LPs as well as a couple of songs from their new album Soundtrack. The new songs were surprisingly decent; the title track sounded like an inspired nourish rocker a la Pulp’s “This Is Hardcore” only darker and louder. The older songs held up pretty well for the most part although they did make a few missteps such as turning the dour, dancy, Joy Division influenced “Life In The Gladhouse” into a schmaltzy, band intro number and not playing any tracks from the unfairly maligned and recently reissued, Stop/Start.

Even though they played very well and the band, especially Grey, have obvious enthusiasm for the material, there seemed to be something missing. Perhaps tellingly, they were at their best when playing songs from their twenty-nine year old debut LP Mesh & Lace. Ironically, these songs sounded the most contemporary and animated with Grey, himself stating his preference for that album over After The Snow before the band launched into a blistering version of “Black Houses”.

The band ended the relatively short set with their two biggest hits, “Hands Across The Sea” and the inevitable, audience sing-along “I Melt With You”. All of which seemed curiously anticlimactic until after a very brief pause they returned to play an excoriating but sadly, shortened version of “Sixteen Days”. As the band tore the song into shreds of guitar feedback and tribal drumming and Grey began jumping around wildly and screaming “sixteen days no bread and water!” the joy and energy they exuded was contagious and you couldn’t help but wish the entire set was as good as the encore.

Photo by Natasha Ryan

Review by Christien Lauro

A surprisingly sparse crowd stood in the late afternoon sun on the banks of the East River this past Sunday to see what I fear will be an odious new trend of nostalgia mongering – bands performing entire classic albums that are not their own. Headlining the inaugural 2010 season Free Pool Party show on the Williamsburg waterfront, all current members of the avant rock acts Deerhoof and Xiu Xiu tore through Joy Division’s seminal debut LP Unknown Pleasures. While I had faith that Xiu Xiu front man, Jamie Stewart, could successfully captain this ship away from the jagged rocks of the unmitigated self indulgent disaster it seemed like it could turn out to be, I was still a little leery that this would be something worth standing outside in the July heat for.

Anyone familiar with Jamie Stewart’s absurdly, sometimes almost comically, disturbing emotional output can easily see the influence of a band like Joy Division and more specifically their troubled lead singer, Ian Curtis’ lyrics, legend and persona. It doesn’t take much imagination to hear echoes of Joy Division or New Order’s music in Deerhoof’s darker and dancier moments either. In fact, it is pretty difficult to listen to much modern music without hearing at least a little bit of Joy Division, really. But does that mean that we need to hear anyone, other than perhaps a money-hungry, reformed New Order, play an entire Joy Division album? Well…no, I suppose not … but damn was it fun!

Photo by Natasha Ryan

After playing urgent but relatively faithful versions of “Disorder” and “Day of Lords”, Deerhoof’s ax slingers finally branched out and frenetically filled up the spaces in the original composition of “Candidate” with squalls of feedback and noise. Not to be outdone, Stewart delivered an intense vocal performance on “Insight”. Most recent Xiu Xiu recruit, Angela Seo, also kicked into high gear on this song with her beautiful updating of the studio original’s rather cheesy keyboard freak-out during the chorus. The appropriately ferocious noise escaping from the speakers as she pounded the keyboard with her fists and Stewart’s screamed refrain of “I’m not afraid anymore!” seemed to challenge the rest of the musicians to answer in kind. As “New Dawn Fades” began everyone was playing furiously. Stewart’s upfront vocals were quite touching as he sang lines such as, “it was me seeing me this time, hoping for something else.” His voice really seemed to channel the feelings of frustration, sadness, desperation and dark humor that anyone who misspent their youth listening to Joy Division would identify with instantly, while at the same time, singing in his own voice. It seemed like something (amps, speakers, audience members) was going to explode if they maintained that level of intensity.

Photo by Natasha Ryan

I have to admit I was very curious to see what they would do with “I Remember Nothing”, the very odd, icy, violently ambient closing track to the album. The original version’s creepy experimentation seemed to readily play to both Deerhoof and Xiu Xiu’s various strengths. The version they played was actually pretty faithful with guitar feedback replacing the original’s keyboard drone. The highlight, aside from Stewart’s barely controlled maniacal vocals, was Seo’s smashing and grinding of dozens of champagne glasses in a large metal trashcan to create the glass breaking effects of the original. All that destruction accompanied Stewart barking lines like “violent, more violent his hand cracks the chair, moves on reaction then slumps in despair” very effectively.

And on that happy note, all the musicians took their leave and did not return. I was hoping for an encore of “Transmission” but it was not to be. The band certainly allayed all my trepidation and I found that I actually enjoyed their performance quite a bit. The fact that none of the musicians significantly changed or rearranged any of the compositions yet any of those songs could easily fit on either bands’, or indeed many modern bands’, current albums is a testament to the enduring originality and power of Joy Division’s music. That this performance seemed much more a violent celebration of Joy Division’s brilliant songs than a inappropriate cashing in of hip, well worn influences is a testament to the valuable continued work of these two leaders of the current underground music scene.

Here’s hoping that Deerhoof and Xiu Xiu come around next summer playing Closer in its entirety.

Here’s some links to check out:

Brooklyn Vegan’s review of the show

More on Deerhoof

More on Xiu Xiu

From the Guardian

“Lou Reed, Laurie Anderson and John Zorn faced a furious crowd on Friday night, playing cacophonous music to a cacophony of boos at the Montreal International Jazz festival. Fans expecting Sweet Jane or Walk On the Wild Side were instead met by the skronk and skree of Reed’s more recent free-jazz work, infuriating sections of the crowd. As audience members hollered their complaints, Zorn responded. “If you don’t think it’s music, then get the fuck outta here.” Then the walk-outs began…”

One commenter in the Montreal Gazette commented:
“it was pure elitist, pretentious rubbish.”

More from the Gazette Review here…

See the video here:

Direct link

Matador Records, an indie label who really peaked with their 90’s output, is celebrating with one of the best at those bands in Las Vegas for their 21st Anniversary. Some of the other bands performing include:
Pavement, Sonic Youth, Belle & Sebastian, Spoon, Yo La Tengo, Cat Power, Jon Spencer Blues Explosion, New Pornographers, Superchunk, Ted Leo & the Pharmacists, Guitar Wolf, Chavez, Girls, Fucked Up, Harlem, Cold Cave, Shearwater, Kurt Vile, Jeffrey Joe Jensen, and more TBA. Read more here

Photo by Shawn McDonald

Frog Eyes’ wild front man, Carey Mercer believes in the transcendental, positive power of music – which is lucky for him, because he was faced with an audience that vacillated between hostility and indifference for most of his band’s stellar performance at the Mercury Lounge this past Saturday night.

The band was in town to support their excellent new double-LP, Paul’s Tomb: A Triumph, which was just released on the Dead Oceans label. Following three opening bands: Beach Fossils, Pearly Gate Music, and You Can Be A Wesley – all of whom delivered under-whelming sets, Frog Eyes took the stage promptly at midnight and launched into a stunning, powerful version of “Odetta’s War” from the new LP.

Despite their impressive set-opener, any good vibes in the room were quickly destroyed by the weekender-heavy crowd’s needless talking and heckling, including many loud and rude comments made by various members of the opening bands. Mercer, undaunted, began regaling the crowd with his childhood dream of being a stand-up comedian instead of a rock musician before launching into another song from Paul’s Tomb. To be fair to his detractors, Mercer’s laconic and somewhat meandering stage banter between songs DID kill the band’s momentum a bit at times, and completely belied his manic, possessed Carny Barker musical performances. He shuddered and shook as if his guitar was giving him mild electric shocks, and he let loose vocals that were part howling invocation and part old timey rave-up exorcism.

The other musicians were no slouches either. Ryan Beattie’s fluid guitar playing and Megan Boddy’s versatile double keyboard playing (which she rocks Ray Manzarek style – where she plays all the bass lines on the keyboard), and her beautiful backing vocals perfectly accompanied Mercer’s frenzied singing and guitar style. His wife, Melanie Campbell’s simple almost martial drumming underpinned all of the songs incredibly well.

Many of the songs broke down into tribal drumming and spiritualized vocalizing that would send chills down Tom Waits’ spine (at one point Mercer broke into an ecstatically demented chorus from “I Put A Spell On You” that could’ve out-screamed Old Screamin’ Jay), only to rise up into tightly controlled chaos as Mercer, Beattie and Boddy deftly wove intricate melodies and notes around each other. In this manner, with scant attention from the crowd, they ran through an hour’s worth of old favorites such as an all-but-unrecognizable, almost gospel version of “Latex Ice Age”, from their 2003 breakthrough LP The Golden River and “Ship Destroyer”, from The Folded Palm, as well as the majority of the new songs off Paul’s Tomb.

The amazing performances given by all of the band members were lost on most of the crowd, who seemed to be in the wrong venue; perhaps some of them (such as the random woman who kept begging them to play “anything I can dance to”) couldn’t get into the chooch-central club Element next door? Perhaps they were too drunk to realize they were on the wrong line and wound up in Mercury Lounge by mistake? Who knows? Despite these setbacks, Mercer spoke throughout the show of his love of music, even dedicating an early song to “the power of music” which he jokingly referred to as a “meta-dedication”. All joking aside, Frog Eyes’ music is all about passion and a need to express an idiosyncratic and very unique vision, which seems to be sadly lacking in most bands’ music currently. One can’t really imagine Mercer doing anything else with his life, childhood dreams of comedy stardom aside.

In an interesting turn of events, just as Mercer looked ready to throw in the towel before announcing their last song, (which turned out to be a ripping, frog-eyed version of “Cloud of Evil”, originally recorded by Mercer’s electronic side project, Blackout Beach), the crowd grew more enthusiastic. Mercer and Beattie took the hint and decided they could do ‘one more’ as the band tore into a ridiculously epic rendition of “A Flower In A Glove” that pushed the ten minute mark. The audience was finally acting like they were at a rock show, and excitedly called out for more. The band capitulated and ended the set with an awe inspiring version of arguably their best recorded song thus far, and a live favorite for several years: “Bushels”, from the 2007 LP, Tears of the Valedictorian. The crowd acted genuinely elated as the song ended. It seems that Mercer’s faith in music was rightfully justified, even if some members of the audience clearly didn’t appreciate it.