These New Puritans, Imperial China, the.Blackout.District @ DC9

June 9, 2008 by Greg  Send to a Friend

all photos: Lexie Moreland

I went into this show with some high expectations.  I adore the recorded output of both These New Puritans and Imperial China and had heard decent buzz about the.Blackout.District.

But a couple of mishaps really dragged the show down and turned a potentially explosive evening of music into more of a small firecracker.

First up were the.Blackout.District.  Heavy with the synth action, catchy modern rock riffs and lingering female vocals, they have a very 90s feel about them that I just couldn’t shake.  Not necessarily a bad thing, just a bit distracting since I was playing a tad bit of nostalgia-driven spot-the-influence.  Once you really focus in, they’ve got a lot more going on underneath the soothing sheen of their music.  Some pretty talented work from both the bassist and guitarist, but the vocals were the big selling point for me, nailing tones from subtle and haunting to full and powerful.  Some unexpected curves were thrown when they shove some rather rudimentary tunes face-first into huge sonic washes, deluging with synths and wall-of-sound guitars, glorious moments but not always maintaining continuity with the tone of a song.  A promising set and I’m excited to see where they go with some new material in maybe 6 months, hopefully figuring out the most effective and organic mix of their strengths.

Imperial China’s set had some bad omens from the start, with a spectre of feedback coming from Brian’s suitcase of effects pedals.  It took about 10 minutes to isolate the cause and with no solution found, Imperial China plunged into their set, feedback and all.  Despite their best efforts, the feedback buzz grew proportionately with their sound and they were unable to drown it out.  Then midway through the second song of their set, the bass cuts out.  Snapped string.  A frantic and frustrated rush ensued to track down another bass and continue the set…to no avail.  And here was the first glimpse of the attitude that These New Puritans carried which disappointed me.

All night I had been looking around DC9 for any of the members of TNPS, peeking a head out, checking out the local openers.  As far as I could tell, they hadn’t deemed us worth their presence.  And now, as a professional courtesy and as a fellow musician, they should have backed Imperial China up. But Brian rushed back on stage, flustered, that TNPS were nowhere to be found.  So Imperial China struggled to soldier on, playing a couple songs from their catalog that didn’t require the bass guitar, including one new song that sounded exellent.  But the tone was set and Imperial China’s set was a done deal.  Unfortunate, since I’ve seen them deliver on many other occasions.  Kudos for sticking it out through the tech issues though…

The techs started setting up the stage for TNPS, and still they were nowhere to be found.  They stormed the stage after about 10 minutes of tech action setting their equipment up for them, TNPS finally rushed on stage, heads down, all business, all disaffected looking.

First things first though, they played a fierce set.  “Swords of Truth” was a deliciously dub, tense, floor shaking jam.  Fantastic vocal delivery and performance from Jack, even underneath all that chain-mail.  I actually liked “En Papier” much better live than expected, since I find the repetition of the chorus is obnoxious recorded.  “Infinity” and “£4″ approached meltdown-level intensity.  “Numerology” soared, again despite the somewhat obnoxious chorus and “Elvis” found them knocking the majority of buzzed-about Brit indie bands flat on their asses.

So if all this went down right musically, what stopped me from loving this show?

Let’s start with the petulantly delivered “Thank yous”, like a child insincerely obliging a parent in order to avoid reprisal.  Another audience member remarked to me that she was disappointed in the turn-out.  That if this show was in London, TNPS would have sold the place out.  I don’t dispute this fact.  But even if this, the first stop on their first US tour, didn’t meet their expectations, there’s no excuse for the air of superiority.  I thought the keyboardist was going to slit her wrists mid-set she looked so disaffected and stoically disconnected from the show.  How about the kicker, a swift “thanks” at the close of the set and the entire band bolted for backstage, heads down and unresponsive to any compliments or audience interaction.

With a venue this intimate and an audience this small, it doesn’t take long to meet and greet with people who are likely true fans of your music.  Sure there are myriad potential reasons for this attitude…jet lag, the aforementioned disappointing attendance, a few tech issues, but few justify it.  A brief word, a smile, a bit of actual joy in playing your music…these minor things can go miles and drastically change the tone of a show, making it more enjoyable for everyone.  Maybe they are just too young to realize this.  Here’s hoping they can learn and back up their music with a more positive attitude.  Sorry for the motivational speaking, I just had to vent.

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