all (kick ass) photos: Josh Sisk (from the Baltimore show)
all words: Wlada Kolosova (our new intern, on an exchange program from Germany, so play nice)
Usually, there are three types of concert goers:
- The mass which behaves adequate to the music (moshing, crying tears of joy, clapping hands and chanting when asked)
- The girl who would blissfully closes her eyes and waves her hair.
- The I’ve-totally-listened-to-them-before-they-got-popular-individuals, working hard on being unimpressed and wearing faces so indifferent, it makes you wonder if they got the ticket by accident.
Matt&Kim’s show on Wednesday was an exception to that rule. Everybody, EVERYBODY, even the deliberately bored, had their smiles stapled to their ears for the whole gig. And the hair-waving-girl didn’t have any space for her dance of expression because the crowd was spastically energetically flailing their appendages. The show was more of a dance party than a “Me - Musician, You - audience” concert, where the roles are clear. Here, everybody was just a cell in a very HAPPY organism - everybody joyful, everybody equal, everybody loves their next. Sounds like a Sunday Mass? Yup. You’ve got the picture.
Actually, there is no task more ungrateful than reviewing Matt&Kim. No matter what I write, I have to be scared of the angry hipster mob to maul me. To the urban bohemians the couple from Brooklyn is what The Kelly Family used to be to teenagers: Either you love them or you hate them with all your passion (and are very loud about it). There is nothing in between. You can’t be indifferent to Matt&Kim; you MUST take a side.
Well, if I’m going to be lynched anyway, I might as well be condemning without giving any reason why. I didn’t like them. I was overfed on their overly cheerful sound after fifteen minutes. Too poopy for my taste. No need for further explanation.
But! I’m definitely giving Matt&Kim more credit for their physical condition rather than for their musical achievements. Seriously! You must be in the shape of an athlete to be SO! CONSTANTLY! HAPPY! I wonder if they have sore mimic muscles after their shows. In the dark past I’ve been a Funkemariechen (which is something like a German Carnival Cheerleader) and trust me: you get smiling cramps after a while! And I’d also like to know their work-out for being able to keep up this speed. Especially with Kim I couldn’t get this Duracell ad out of my mind, where the bunny keeps on drumming and drumming and drumming and drumming… May the hipsters loathe and the critics gnaw, there is one thing you certainly can’t blame the duo for: These guys were really working their fees off! There was a lot of bouncing and jumping around and wiggling. By the way: with Amanda Blank it was basically the same except for next to lots of bouncing and lots of wiggling there was also a lot of hair. Dressed in a Flashlight-sque black leather (?) latex (?) rubber (?) bodysuit, she was dancing on the very thin line (boarder) between eclectic and epileptic. She was the DEFINITION of energy! She was manic! And scary. But in a good way. Liked this better than the happy-go-lucky main act.
Long story short: Don’t care about Matt&Kim’s music. But definitely want to do their drugs. Or even better: do THEM. The duo was, literally, sweating HAPPINESS out of their pores. I couldn’t get the imagination out of my head about Matt&Kim being like these hallucinogen toads you always see in cartoons but never on Discovery Channel. The crowd was probably thinking the same. When Matt got off the stage, the masses just jumped on him, touching, patting and poking his lubricious body. I wonder if someone took a lick.
full set here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/joshsisk/sets/72157622281908495/detail/
see all of josh's matt and kim photos from years past here:
http://www.flickr.com/search/?q=matt+kim&w=50009481@N00&s=int
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
God loves a cheerful giver.
I reviewed Matt and Kim once, and it is indeed difficult (moreso than any movie, to be sure). Despite LOVING the show, I approve of the phrase "Too poopy for my taste."
Nice work, New Intern!
I don't even like Matt & Kim... and I STILL think this review was awful. Here's a tip to inspiring writers - avoid writing about yourself or the backlash you're waiting on as a large chunk of your live-review.
BYT - you'd think you'd know better not to preface something you're willing to publish with "give her some slack"! Stand strong behind the work of your writers and resign yourself to being the hipster-lifestyle-marketing mindless concert-party-scenester-photoblog that you are....or GET BETTER WRITERS. The amount of steaming doo-doo on here is getting a bit suffocating - especially with live-show reviews. A true shame, as you've done a brilliant job as an event/promotional website and have a large readership at your hands.
I'm not sure there's much else to say except that my college-bound 18year-old sister sent me this review in an email. The body simply read, "This is about as big of a disaster as that Major Lazer review BYT did that mentioned Diplo doing "DJ stuff"
*aspiring not inspiring
sorry your new intern inspired me!
Go easy on the metaphors homegirl.
Yeah, I write here. Wednesdays. And anytime anything electronic or dance related happens. I write about other types of music, too, pretty much all over the internets.
http://ow.ly/qjoV
Some other thoughts on the show.
Wlada. Welcome to BYT. Find me somewhere around the city, we'll drink, and laugh about this, and you can tell me about Germany. You got a tough assignment for the first one out.
Now let's all go on about our day.
Lauren - and what credentials do you have for giving writers tips on how to write?
Personally: "Don’t care about Matt&Kim’s music. But definitely want to do their drugs. Or even better: do THEM." I liked.