BrightestYoungThings: LiveDC: Girls/ NOBUNNY @ 930 Club

all words: Philip Runco
all photos: Aditya Banerjee

Justin Chapman, dressed ridiculously in a small black leather jacket and his underwear, peered out from behind a scuzzy rabbit mask and in his undulating voice said something not ridiculous: “This is only the third day with this line-up, so cut us a little slack.”

It was a reasonable request. No one was expecting perfection from his band, Nobunny. In fact, its charm lies in the ramshackle energy with which it produces a sweaty mess of garage rock and punk. But if audience members happened to notice the trio temporarily out of sync, or heard a missed chord here or there, Chapman was just asking them to roll with it. They’re still working out the kinks. Don’t be a dick.

The crowd seemed perfectly willing to oblige. They slowly trickled in during Nobunny’s set, half paying attention to the band’s rapid-fire succession of two-and-a-half-minute pop nuggets, and politely applauding with moderate appreciation where appropriate. It seemed a bit odd then when Chapman began yelling obscenities at the faceless “haters” in the crowd: despite its attempts at provocation, Nobunny was hardly riling the masses.

In contrast, the night’s headliner, Girls, has proven it can galvanize an audience without even trying. Or maybe it’s precisely because of that lack of effort. It was almost two years ago that the proudly San Franciscan band visited Black Cat and stirred up some strong reactions: "severely underwhelming;” “so weak it was painful to sit through;” “like you were at a local open mic.” Like its future opener, Girls was in transition, playing with an unfamiliar line-up, and perhaps struggling to gain its footing. But expectations were high, and they intertwined with emotional attachments quickly fostered by Girls' debut, Album (2009). Even though this was a band whose appeal was built largely around a frontman who laid bare his emotional frailty and junkie shortcomings, there was little slack to be cut on that evening in November.

Two years later, a Girls that took the 9:30 club stage on Monday didn’t need any excuses. Simply put, the band’s live performance has mirrored the progression of Girls’ sound heard on last year’s Broken Dreams Club EP (2010) and the recently released Father, Son, Holy Ghost LP: it’s grown remarkably assured, alternately tighter and more expansive, and quite lush. And on an ear-ringing performance of scorcher "Die", it can also get loud as hell.

Whereas the band began its Black Cat show limply with frontman Christopher Owens testing the audience’s patience over several meandering, near freeform strummers, Girls shot straight out of the gate this night, flexing the muscle of its five-piece line-up with the delightfully lumbering “Darling”, Broken Dreams Club single “Heartbreaker”, and perhaps the most propulsive song in its catalogue, “Alex”.

Over the course of the set, the band would visit near all the rest of the unabashedly pop moments from its three records, both old (“Laura”, “Lust for Life”) and new (“Honey Bunny”, “Magic”). Those who favor Girls' lighter side - the side that channels Beach Boys, Elvis Costello, and Jonathan Richman liberally - did not leave unsatisfied. (Only “The Oh So Protective One” would be left on the cutting room floor, an understandable omission given that the song’s most memorable component – those bopping trumpets – was nowhere to be found.)

As much as Girls nailed its take on throwback pop and surf rock though, it was on the slow-burning tracks where the band truly left its mark. There were obvious examples of this, the songs most indebted to Spiritualized, like closer “Hellhole Ratrace” and the sprawling advance single “Vomit”, from which the band brilliantly segued into the hard-charging squall of “Morning Light”. Less expected – but no less affecting – were takes on “Substance” and “Love Like a River”, songs that began languidly and unassuming enough, but gradually grew swollen with feedback, harmonica, and warm slabs of organ, becoming something all-consuming and utterly engrossing.

Amidst all this noise was Owens, his fragile voice emoting some of the most vulnerably sad-sack songs around, with just enough charisma to avoid playing the shrinking violet. Girls may reappropriate classic rock tropes across the whole stretch of the 60s and 70s, but coupled with his “boney body” and “dirty hair,” Owens' squeamish honesty harkens back to the mid-90s; “cry-baby music,” as it was memorably dismissed in “Clueless”. It’s a characteristic that makes Girls an anti-buzz band, even if they are so often dubbed one. The fact that this show was only two-thirds full speaks to that: Girls isn’t a particularly cool band to like; it’s a band that makes records for loners, for long and lonely nights.

By Owens side, as always, was bassist Chet “J.R.” White. White is a comically perfect foil to Owens. White’s big, burly, and stoic, looking a bit on Monday like Brad Garrett playing an early 80s loan shark; Owens is rail-thin, small, and effeminate, his blonde hair clipped in back with a barrette. Musically, his bass lines were aggressively buoyant, pulling Owens’ up from wallowing in his pathos. (White is mixed less prominently on Father, Son, Holy Ghost, but live, he rises back to the surface.)

White’s contributions – and to a lesser degree, keyboardist Dan Eisenberg’s – are essential to Girls. As much as Owens is the heart of the band, he doesn’t yet have the stage presence to carry things on his own. The night’s sole underwhelming moment came at the start of the band’s encore, when Owens emerged alone for a solo rendition of “Broken Dreams Club”. As the crowd chatter built, so did Owens’ self-consciousness; he began to self-mockingly mug and mock the song’s sincerity. It was hard to not feel bad for him.

Still, this was one bump in an otherwise stellar performance. Rare is the band that makes losing sound so winning.

Previously in Live DC:

8 months ago Phelps said

This show was fucking awesome. The strides made in 2 years in confidence, writing, and just being a better performer - I can't remember a recent progression so marked. Great pics, great review.