Concert Review: Sunset Rubdown at Mercury Lounge

Well folks, it's fall in New York, and we all know what that means: a new concert season. Typically starting at the beginning of September there are more shows than I have time to attend, but this season I wasn't up for it. Fortunately friends were on their game and got me tickets to shows that I would probably like to see.

I have seen Sunset only a few other times, and usually I really like them. They lack the professional polish of Wold Parade, and its completely charming and wacky (much like their music). But this time something was amiss. D and A blamed it on the audience, but I think that good audiences often reflect good acts. This is certainly not a hard fast rule, but its usually pretty safe. So I am going to divide the blame for this in half: 50% lame ass audience, 50% band fault.

Although the sound was good, I felt like there were a few too many unfamiliar songs (and I like to hear a new song or two, its a little hard to really enjoy entirely new music from an old favorite.) That said, the new songs did leave me with high hopes for the next release, which I think is as yet unscheduled. I also felt a general lack of enthusiasm from them, like they weren't really that excited to be hanging out with us. Possibly because they played the night before at Music Hall of Williamsburg?

Despite my usual harsh and critical review, I still will go see them at every opportunity, and I still think they have some of most interesting music out there right now. So you should go see them, and buy their CDs. For that matter, buy a tee shirt too. Lets support Canada.


<3 the Elephant

Sunset does Black Cab

Um, I'm pretty sure that Camilla cut her hair to be like mine. No? Um yeah, you were there, she totally did it after we met in Brooklyn.

I know the important thing here is the PHENOMENAL new song, You Go On Ahead.

<3 The Elephant

Sunset Rubdown and the Official Worst Opener Contest

By the nature of going to indie shows, one hears a lot of mediocre or outright crappy opening bands. I love openers, and have seen many good ones, including Final Fantasy, see the Take Away Show here, also saw Mobius Band as an opener.
That brings us to the Brooklyn Masonic Temple on thursday evening. I went with a couple of friends to check out Spencer Krug and one of his crews, Sunset Rubdown. (I'm not giving them a link, because the other person who reads this blog besides myself knows who they are). We missed the first group, but got there in time to hear a good portion of the second opener, Blood on the Wall. Listen to their Myspace, and then completely ignore what you heard, because it doesn't represent the band we saw. The band we saw featured low, screechy female vocals (i know, low AND screechy, crazy!). It also featured high screechy male vocals. You remember how I feel about screechy, see my Fuck Buttons post. Anyways, they were the embodiment of terrible rock music. As all 3 of my friends independently pointed out, they were like a horrible, horrible pixies cover band. Only with Clap Your Hands Say Yeah style vocals. And less skill. And more noise. I am not sure how much more I can elaborate on the fact that I just really, thought they suuuuuuuuuucked. It wasn't painful in the same way that Phil and The Ossophers was, but still it was miserable. How did they end up opening? It was Boost Mobile event, so I'm blaming them. I am going to start documenting all the terrible openers, and then proclaim the worst at the end of this year, called "The Official Worst Opener Contest". There will be some sort of prize....

So Sunset Rubdown played an awesome set, combining things from their two most recent albums, although I'm not sure if there was anything from the EP. They played a bunch of the Daytrotter session, and it just felt like Spence was really into it. Its interesting, because Random Spirit Lover songs blend together, so we were wondering how that would play out live. It ended up being really cool, because as they segued from one song to the next and it wasn't the song I was expecting, which i really liked. They joked about long spaces in between songs, but it never bothered me. There was a sense of suspense, and a little bit of trickery. Spence is definitely tricky. The more I listen to his work, the stronger his themes become, always horses, whores, nighttime (or time in general) or maybe its light? Childhood...fear. Anyways, feel free to comment (lol, people reading the blog) on this idea of his themes, he did say in his pitchfork interview about SR that all of his songs have meaning.

So once again, they were amazing, and we had a nice chat with Camilla and also with David Horvtz about the Polaroid Project. Also made a new friend, and I got his number for us, so yay networking! A good time was had by all, presumably.