Brightest Young Things

all photos: Dakota Fine
(see full set here: click click)

I was determined to attend this show sans prior research and sans expectations of the headlining act.

Through the word-of-mouth that had sifted in my direction, I gathered that Le Loup were a good bunch of people. Everyone who’d heard of them had positive things to say, and this perspective usually seemed to accompany an assertion of friendship with at least one member of the band. It sort of blew my mind, and I thought to myself, am I just completely out of le loop or are these folks some kind of networking demi-gods? Since the former is usually the case, I headed to the show resolved to join the club and befriend at least one member of the posse.
I’ve started to realize lately that Friday is sort of an enigma when it comes to putting on your party boots. Your mind is totally prepared to get down and boogey but your fragile physical self is drained from the seemingly endless days of monotonous sitting, typing, and clicking you’ve been doing all week.
The hours I spent Friday afternoon at the office surfing the web and watching college basketball truly took it out of me.
I assumed that heading home early would solve these problems but I was only pressed with tougher questions:
Do I down that slender and seductive-looking “Champagne of Beers” before running out the door? Yes. But do I imbibe another?
God only knows.

Mind cleared and ready for action, I found myself pressing forward up the stairs of the Black Cat to the main stage. My stalwart colleague (and talented photographer), Dakota, and I maneuvered deftly through the sparse but looming group of young folks to the front of the arena. The band just announced that they had “a couple more” songs to play. Sweet.
I admired the frontman’s retired-fireman moustache and thought about how top-lip-hair really seems to be coming back with a vengeance.

Bellman Barker. The four-piece was a great start to this musical bonanza of an evening. I only caught two songs but slid right in to their take on assured post-power-pop. With a sound reminiscent of the feeling you get at late-afternoon summer pool parties in middle school, I dug their comforting sing-along melodies and expected-but-fulfilling raucous chord progressions. Properly equipped with poindexter glasses and shimmering sleigh bell accompaniments, these fun-loving dudes warmed up the progressively growing crowd with banter about xylophones and house parties. Next time I break out the Slip-and-Slide and Capri Sun, let it be known that Bellman Barker will be pumping out of the sporty yellow water-resistant cassette deck, squeezed between Weezer and Belle-and-Sebastian.

It seemed like the perfect time to take a meet-and-greet break. So I did. And as I did, I noticed a trio of colorful characters taking the stage. Could these clowns in faux-aboriginal garb be the same group that had been playing non-stop in my On-The-Go 6 iPod playlist for the last few weeks? Dear Lord, I hoped so.

Let me preface the following sure-to-be-biased words by disclaiming my already present and burgeoning admiration for the Ruby Suns. I love the Beach Boys. And I get the impression these New Zealanders do too. But the Ruby Suns seem to have taken the words from “Surfin’ Safari” literally and embarked on a truly global exploration of rhythms and melodies. Adorning their mini-Korg MIDI controllers with the flora and fauna of NZ’s islands, and sporting the native headgear of Atlanta Braves’ fans, I admired the penchant for cross-cultural feigned naiveté the psychedelic rainbow face-painted young women in the group so proudly embraced. And then the music began.

The Suns worked digital drum loops, 50’s doo-wop harmonies, and fuzzy chugging basslines, along with inescapably melodic key-and-guitar atmospherics into a Polynesian-inspired polyrhythmic paradise. Starting off with the danceable “There are Birds,” the trio reminded you of contemporaries like Panda Bear, if only Panda Bear got really into Afro-National music and sang about Elephants eating leaves. “Kenya Dig It?” evoked a spirit something akin to Phil Spector rolling around in an unkempt backyard jungle of long weeds and sunflowers.

With all members of the band rotating instruments throughout the set, I was impressed with their ability to round out a full and nuanced sound, fully incorporating flutes and cowbells, with so little personnel-wise. As they finished with an ode to a tree, “Tane Mahuta,” I looked down the front row of hopping and hand-clapping attendees, and couldn’t see a frown on anyone’s face. Apparently they most certainly could dig it.

The place was packed at this point. I noticed a few youngsters’ laudable attempt at “raising the roof” to some between-set dance numbers. I got the distinct impression that everyone was ready to see Le Loup rock the house.

And so they did. I learned a few things quickly: the band comprised of 6, wait…7, ladies and gents. And this was a homecoming “of sorts,” which could explain the crowd’s mass-familiarity. Armed with 3 or 4 guitars, a potent drummer, bass player, and keyboardist, the band was led by a frontman small in stature but large in heart. Their aggregate inspired spirit immediately took me. I was pleasantly reminded of similar-minded group The Arcade Fire in the way their high-energy ensemble approach to progressive and cerebral rock built into a riotous crescendo. The piano-driven shifting dynamics played tribute to Kid A/Amnesiac-era Radiohead while seamlessly integrating the group’s own boisterous chorale of emotive optimism. This was how the French Horn was meant to be played!

I couldn’t shake the feeling that Paul Simon’s illegitimate Canadian son had joined an art-collective in Montreal that rocked out to AC/DC once in a while. Just as I overheard some drunkard next to me mumbling, “The banjo. Where’s the banjo? I’m all about the banjo. They need more banjo,” a banjo magically appeared on stage, and in good hands. The crowd was eating this up! And, well heck, I was too. As the singer threw himself unabashedly into down-right lyrical compositions, I admired the bombastic execution of the band’s angsty affects. Throughout the set of tightly orchestrated melodramatic ebb-and-swell burners, my fellow black-cattians grooved and swayed with the best of them.

Good shit, right down to final encore. Maybe it was just Miller’s macrobrew, but I felt like I was truly living the Friday night High Life.

and now for some people having fun at the Cat on a Friday.
ready???
ok.

Previously in Live DC:

• 2/13: LiveDC: George Clinton & The Parliament-Funkadelic @ 930 Club
• 2/13: LiveDC: Veronica Falls/ Brilliant Colors @ Black Cat
• 2/13: LIVE DC: Steve Aoki/ Datsik/ Alvin Risk @ Fillmore
• 2/13: LiveDC: The Darkness @ 930 Club
• 2/9: LiveDC: Theophilus London @ 930 Club
• 2/9: Best Weekend Bets
• 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