Brightest Young Things

all words: Peter Heyneman
all photos: Shauna Alexander

MUSIC! Music music music. Music! MUSIC! MUSIC! MUSIC!! MUSIC!!!! MUSIC! MusicMusicmusicMusicmusicmusicmusic! Music. BALLS YES MUSIC!

I arrived wednesday at the Black cat backstage just in time to miss (Colin Crowe on behalf of) Buildings AGAIN. I really enjoy their recorded output and I once saw the dude from this band shoot a bottle rocket into a parked car but I always manage to show up a minute too late for their shows which I hear are really weird. Apparently it was just bottlerocket man playing by himself so it would have been even weirder. Terribly sorry gents, next time I swear on my Masters Degree that I will be there with my whole ass. MUSE SICK IMO.

Bear In Heaven were playing when I showed up and I was surprised at how jaunty they were compared to their slightly sedentary myspace songs. Even though kids were sitting on the floor in front of the stage, their ethereal Ummagumma tendencies were anchored by the excellent brisk drumming and they even danced a little onstage during their song “Wholehearted Mess,” maybe because a bunch of DJs just remixed it into a disco song, or maybe because it’s got two fancy laid-back washed-out good time hooks in it instead of just one. In general I was happily surprised by the whole late-era Genesis tunefulness of their songs, at time recalling even our hometown heroes Bluebrain when they switched on the vox efx and crooned. Even though I was there to see a more MUUUUUUUUUSICCCCCCCCCCCCCCC kind of band. Which is Free Energy. Who, jesus chirst.

Seriously. You guys. Free Energy. I am entirely gay for them. They came out on stage with big shit eating grins on their mugs like they just crop-dusted all of us, or like the cool kids who don’t at all get the jokes you’re telling them but are just laughing at you condescendingly because you’re so cute when you try hard. Paul Spranger, lead singer guy, was like 6’5 170 wearing jeans so tight he was essentially fashionably naked. They got off to a rocky start when one of the guitarists kept fiddling with his amp, which squealed in protest every time he got near it, but Paul just cackled and told us that was their signature sound. He had that willowy lanky mid-length hair which he stole like his vocal range from Iggy, but he did this awkward and utterly natural shrugging dance to the beats along with some patented jagger dips straight out of the Start Me Up spandex video and yes I know there were other people in the band but I did say I went gay for them OK but also for the MUSIC DUDEBRO THAT’S WHAT RLY MATTERS HERE.

MUSIC: They fucking destroyed. The beats Oh God the slow, the classic We Will Rock You beats. It’s like they took everything good about late 80s hair metal, without irony, and physically forced it go through vintage equipment. Or like if Flipper was a huge Brownsville Station fan through hypnosis. Plus wide eyed Obamaptimism. “This is all we got tonight. We are young and still alive.” (Barely both but fuck yeah Hope Me Baby) They are kind of joking almost, but only in the sense that M/U/S/I/C this pure and simple can only come from a philosophy that takes everysinglething with glorious, in-your-face sincerity. One song sounded like the goddamn Georgia Satellites IM NOT PLAYING WITH YOU MOTHERFUCKERS.

They played way too few songs, I could have basked in the muted major chords and blazing hammeroffs all night. Their last song was a supermegahit called Bang Bang Pop Pop that I haven’t been able to find online anywhere and if they don’t record it soon everyone who heard it will die like in that movie Crank starring Jason Stratham, who if he were there would have been all about the heart-starting MUSIC and would have been shakin his bald British head and pumping his fist like, well, I was honestly the only one dancing, but like everyone else wanted to I could tell. If I cared about authenticity or image, or paying your dues, or how unfair it is that kids can just luck into the perfect sound at the perfect time and get signed by DFA and become hugely successful out of the blue with big smiles and open hearts like the world of rock business isn’t a brutal anal maw of fetid horror, I might be bitter watching these dudes unflinchingly shrug into what huge success I guarantee is coming their way—but I don’t care about that. All I care about is//say it with me//

Previously in Live DC:

• 2/8: LiveDC: Kathleen Edwards @ 930 Club
• 2/8: LiveDC: Thurston Moore/ Kurt Vile @ Black Cat
• 2/8: LiveDC: Thurston Moore/ Kurt Vile @ Black Cat
• 2/7: LiveDC: Demetri Martin @ Warner Theatre
• 2/7: LiveDC: Augustana/ Graffiti6 @ 930 Club
• 2/6: LiveDC: All Things Go Presents: Reptar/ Casual Curious/ Fort Lean @ Gibson Guitar Showroom
• 2/6: LiveDC: TYCHO/ Beacon @ RNR Hotel
• 2/6: LiveDC: The Kills / Jeff The Brotherhood @ 9:30 Club
• 2/3: Live DC: The Asteroids Galaxy Tour @ RnR Hotel
• 2/3: LiveDC: Smith Westerns @ Black Cat