It must be tough to find good fits to open for tUnE-yArDs now that Merrell Garbus et. al. have made the leap to sellout headliners. tUnE-yArDs’ music shares little kinship with prevailing indie rock tropes, and not just because Garbus doesn’t bother with guitars, or that she doesn’t bother with a stringency of structure. Other bands may be composing poems (if they’re lucky). Garbus is, in a very particular sense, writing sonnets.
So perhaps Prussia were as good a pairing as one can expect. A bunch of boys with guitars, they did an entirely adequate job of juggling indie signifiers–a floor tom tuned to Thunderous; a precocious, nasal singer who sings through his indie T-shirt in moments of high dudgeon; puppyish three-part harmonies; a guitarist who sings as though pronouncing a death sentence from the Intergalactic Throne of Jupiter with near-complete disregard for the location of his microphone. That is: a band you could be happy to have seen more or less by happenstance.
Because there was absolutely no mistaking the main event on Wednesday night. tUnE-yArDs bassist Nate Brenner got an immense cheer for appearing on stage simply to set up the considerable percussion array. And when Garbus took the stage alone, the cheering was rapturously ardent. This is tUnE-yArDs’ moment.
Not that Garbus is pandering. Her music is, for lack of a better term, difficult in stretches, and tUnE-yArDs does not shy away from the cacophonous, antiphonous complexity of w h o k i l l. Garbus took the stage alone, with what might have been a vocal warmup – as if she’d simply forgotten to do it prior to coming on stage, and oh well--were it not so bewitching. She careened her way through different incarnations of a small set of notes-–growled, yodeled, through the teeth, swooped and dropped–-and knit together a song.
And then suddenly the show was on: Garbus rattled off the signature coos that underpin “My Country,” looped them, and turned to methodically thump her tom while the rest of the band – Brenner and two horns – set to. Garbus builds many of her songs around affirmations–-angry, confessional, revolutionary-–and when the first rolled around (The worst thing about living a lie / Is just wondering when they’ll find out), the crowd roared along, as they did for the rest of the night. College kids: they always know the words.
“Riotriot” worked its way through serpentine dissonance to Garbus’ bellowed declaration, “There is a freedom in violence that I don’t understand and like I’ve never felt before!” and the ensuing catharsis sent segments of the crowd into pogo-ing ecstasies. That’s another thing about tUnE-yArDs: people dance. Helplessly, sometimes.
“Bizness,” which had the singalong at maximum, is the perfect single. Only Garbus could tie together esoteric cooing with a snarled verse and yet let it yield to a chorus that sounds, in its oddball, reggae-indebted spareness, like vintage Police.
There is something oddly mesmerizing about the staging of tUnE-yArDs’ hyperlinked songs; you fleetingly meet each of the individual sounds that will shortly coalesce and multiply in cacophonous unison, like flashing the pieces of a puzzle before your eyes, or being handed the instructions for building a rocket ship during liftoff.
If some of the above makes tUnE-yArDs sound cerebrally formalist, let me disabuse you: at the halfway point in “Powa”–-shortly before the climactic Beyoncé (or is it Mariah?) moment–-this happily married man would have slept with Garbus, or married her, or become her leatherclad slave had she only asked, with even the slightest of gestures. Which she didn’t. I suppose I should be grateful.
DOWNLOAD: tUnE-yArDs - Powa (MP3) or Follow us for more tUnE-yArDs MP3s (Twitter)
Two songs go in, one comes out. Pick a side.
thanks so much nadine! probably the best compliment a photog can get!
and thanks for reminding me to embed the video in the post too!
by Steve Benoit on Sun May 20, 2012 at 09.33 am from the entry: Father John Misty + Har Mar Superstar - Brighton Music Hall (Boston, MA; May 16, 2012)
I can’t get over how these photos captured my up close memory of the night.
by nadine on Sat May 19, 2012 at 11.08 pm from the entry: Father John Misty + Har Mar Superstar - Brighton Music Hall (Boston, MA; May 16, 2012)
Or should it be whoever? F my grammar.
by nadine on Sat May 19, 2012 at 10.30 pm from the entry: Father John Misty + Har Mar Superstar - Brighton Music Hall (Boston, MA; May 16, 2012)
Whomever took these photos certainly captured the night!
by nadine on Sat May 19, 2012 at 10.26 pm from the entry: Father John Misty + Har Mar Superstar - Brighton Music Hall (Boston, MA; May 16, 2012)
“Mindkilla” is awesome. I’ve got this music video last week and really impressed through watching every performance particularly “Glass Jar”. Thanks dude. :)
dance contest
by Mark Waugh on Thu May 17, 2012 at 05.54 am from the entry: Gang Gang Dance's Illuminating "Mindkilla"
Also, I have yet to pay this venue a visit, is it good spot? good people, good vibe, good atmosphere?
... man, i hope i win some tickets…
by Jaz Bonnin-Aldatz on Thu May 17, 2012 at 12.27 am from the entry: It's all good, see Fishbone for free at Fête
Looking forward to the show. Would love to win some tix for my pals.
by MC Breath on Wed May 16, 2012 at 07.40 pm from the entry: It's all good, see Fishbone for free at Fête
