Lessons learned: if you promise 6000 people access to an early show (6 pm doors) at a "first come first served" basis - most of them are not even going to try to make it. Which is a shame, since the Spoon show at 930 last night was awesome. Even if I had to run from work in my young professional fall dress from Banana and lug my suitcase of a bag to it.
Joel was there to take photos, and NPR streamed it all, and I am about to tell you how it all went.
OK?
So, doors at 6, The Ponys at 7, Spoon at 8 (some people actually showed up at 10 as the show was ending, thinking that that is when the headliner will be on). Note: check the set times. And check them often.
The Ponys opened.
Now, I have never seen The Ponys live, but I have heard good things about their shows (they last played the Cat with Jay Reatard) plus I ran into Jason from Modernist Society there (word of warning: when I go to shows alone I will totally latch onto you) and he knew them personally from Chicago and vouched for how cool they were.
All of which I am sure is true, but the only thing I can say about The Ponys is that they made me wish I was not 27 and living in 2007 in DC, but 14 and living in Seattle in 1994.
There is something very basic rock-out about them, that makes you want to wear flannel shirts (their singer did), headbang (needless to say, DC at 7 pm on a Tuesday is incapable of headbanging) and maybe have one too many wine coolers so you can make your very first bad decisions.
Which is not a bad thing, but I do think a place like the Cat or RNR is a better venue for them, more down and dirty, you know.
Then Spoon came on.
Now, I have never seen Spoon live, but I have heard good things about their live shows plus I ran into Faye from the Better Half and her boyfriend Daniel, who has toured with them extensively (did I mention I was at the show alone?), and they assured me that I am in for a treat.
Which I was.
Spoon is
a. a great band
b. a great band with enough catalog and touring experience to ensure a solid-all-good-all-the-time-almost-2-hour-set
c. fronted by Britt Daniel, who, lets face it, is kind of a God.
Britt is the thinking girl's (and boy's) indie heartthrob and you can see why.
All tall and gangly and neatly yet casually pressed, he sings with the intensity the smartest boy in your class had when he thought really hard about whatever smartest boys in classes think about. You loved that boy then, and so you will love him now.
The set was as tight as a perfectly tuned guitar string, the beats were layered thick and heavy and the amazingly spare all-primary-color-wheel light show was the perfect back drop for some of the best pop songs written in the 2000s. There, I said it.
Some of the BEST ROCK SONGS written in the 2000s.
The best thing about them being that even at their fastest/loudest Spoon songs come across as intimate as the most intimate of torch songs. You are there, beat in, beat out, taken to the Delicate Place where the beast and the dragon adore themselves and rooting for the Underdog. And you may not want to leave.
So you make the band play 2 encores.
And want more, even if they almost gave your their all.
And then it is 10 pm and the night is still young but you are so full of good, you can't take it anymore.
And you promise yourself, as you are going to sleep, to see Spoon always.
Previously in Live DC:
- 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
- 2/7: LiveDC: Augustana/ Graffiti6 @ 930 Club
God loves a cheerful giver.
Spoon is ghey.
if by britt being a god you mean britt being an arrogant dick, then yes!
there are many arrogant dicks in the world.
the majority of whom have no right to arrogance because well, they've done nothing special to deserve that right.
Britt, if this is in fact true, I'm willing to forgive.
Great review. I was at the seemingly equally magical Yo La Tengo show, but am too busy to write it up and have no pretty pictures.
Spoon "Ga Ga Ga Ga"...156,000 units sold
The only special thing Britt Daniel has done is waste his record company's money.
they came on at 8 and were off by 9 (not including encore...) i thought they killed it, but it was a short set and an early night. totally worth it, though, and i was shocked by how empty the place seemed given its "sold out" status. anyone else see britt spit beer all over the dude in the front row?
I always count the encore as part of the show.
Doesn't everyone?
I mean, the band plans on it, and saves songs for it, the audience plans on it, it is just called an "encore" pro-forma. We all know its coming.
I was out by 9.45 so -almost 2 hours, I should say?
oh yeah, and as I said at the beginning: it looks like half the ticket holders either thought it was a later show or decided to not even go and try the whole "first come first served" angle. Oddly empty.
... 1.75 is close enough to 2
i took day quill in order to function enough to make it there, so don't mind me. thanks for the review though!
only 155,000? seriously? that's it?
All Time Low from Baltimore sold 60,000 copies of their EP "Put Up or Shut Up" on the warped tour this summer. Spoon ought to switch up their steeze.
Re: 156,000 units sold
Does that include digital sales? I got mine on emusic...
i can understand the low sales. the cd sucks..so boring.
Spoon totally have some of the best-written songs of the 2000's. Their catalog from Girls Can Tell to now is flawless. There are not that many bands that can make great songs so consistently. And they're awesome live.
speaking of flawless:
Great review. I wholeheartedly agree on all fronts.
Britt is quite the opposite of an arrogant dick. He leaned over and apologized to the guy in the front row for spitting beer on him, mopped up a beer he spilled on stage with the only towel he had, and made a point of thanking the fans who stuck around to talk to the band afterwards. He was actually quite polite and thoughtful.
I wish all shows were as good as Tuesday night's. It was definitely in my top five shows of the year.
hahaha jesus christ you morons, 156,000 records sold is absolutely fucking insane for a band on MERGE RECORDS. "low sales"? what kind of market do you think this is? if an indie band sells >10k, they're doing amazingly well compared to 99.5% of their contemporaries.