Jackie and I went to see Neko Case Saturday night at the El Rey Theater, about three blocks from Jackie’s place in LA. Here’s my report on that show:
First of all, the fact that we could actually walk to an event in LA was in itself quite surreal. There was a long line, and even though the theater is pretty big, it was really crowded even early. It was a pretty nice venue: a converted old theater with a lowered center area, round booths and couches along either side and a three-sided bar at the back, big chandeliers and a raised stage. When we got there, the first opener was playing, a guy named Dexter Romweber. He sang and played guitar, and had an upright bass and drums. He was horrible. I mean, really awful. It always amazes me when a good headliner has a lousy opening act. He was exactly what you would expect to see in a dingy bar outside of Akron, Ohio. He was a beer-bellied, slovenly looking guy with a messy pompadour. He tried very hard to sound like Elvis, but his voice was painfully flat (really, it was like bad karaoke) and gross, his guitar playing was crass and the songs were stupid. They were also all rip-offs. One song was the exact copy of the old blues song “Sittin’ On Top of the World”, but with different, dumber lyrics. Another was a copy of a Howlin’ Wolf song, and although he tried to sing like Mr. Wolf, it was embarrassingly bad. We hung out in the back waiting for him to finish before moving onto the floor. The thing that was really so bad about this guy was that he went on forever. The show was supposed to start at 8, and although I don’t know when he actually started, he didn’t quit until at least 9:30.
Alright, enough about that. We moved up towards the front of the floor for the second act, The Sadies. I had heard of them, knew they’d been around a few years, but didn’t know much else. They’re a quartet from Toronto, although I think some members are from different parts of Ontario. The band is fronted by Dallas Good on guitar and vocals, and his brother Travis (twin?) on same, plus violin. They also used an upright bass and the drummer had a standard kit. This band was terrific. The Goods switched between lead and backup vocals, and lead and rhythm guitar, often in the same song so smoothly you didn’t even notice. Both had a tendency to pull away from the front of the stage and even turn around while they were playing some of their more interesting guitar lines, which had the effect of forcing you to just take in all of the sound. They started out sounding like a rockabilly band. Their second song sounded like a spaghetti western theme song. Dallas is a laid-back indie rock-looking type whose lips seem to ripple in a circle when he sings, while his brother looked more like a cross between Slash and Neil Young. During the spaghetti western tune, Dallas sang in a high falsetto with his eyes closed, and Travis made all these ridiculous heavy metal wailing grimaces up against the microphone, even though he wasn’t singing at all. It was pretty funny to watch, a cute gag, and got the audience really into their style. Their set just got more and more interesting, as they played a mix of bluegrass, rockabilly, garage rock, country and Chicago blues, often within the same song. It was a rare case of sounding very familiar while really being a unique sound, kind of like Camper van Beethoven although less cheeky. One song started as speed rock, then shifted into bluegrass, and ended up as a doo-wop blues where the lyrics “Baby, baby, shoop shoop” didn’t sound ridiculous at all. And they had great chops, too. Some of their songs were instrumentals, and they did one sort of Turkey in the Straw breakdown that featured Travis on lead. After the first 32-bar iteration, Jackie said to me, “That’s some good guitar playing”. But then they picked it up and played it again faster. Very nice. Then they did it again, faster. Impressive. Then again, very very fast. Damn. The song ended, and then just when the audience was about to applaud, they picked it up and did it one last time at breakneck speed. It may not have been the fastest guitar playing I’ve ever heard, but it was pretty damn close. The cool thing was Dallas was also playing a combo of lead and rhythm, and so for many of their songs there was some really beautiful counter-melodic layering. They also did an old spiritual called “Higher Power” as a rockabilly song, and pulled it off well. Travis played fiddle for about a third of the tunes, and was not quite as impressive as on guitar, but still very good. He had the bigger, stronger voice, although Dallas’ bass baritone worked in a Johnny Cash sort of way. I imagine they get better audience responses elsewhere; the LA crowd seemed too cool to really get into anything.
OK, so finally Neko came on. Last time I saw her (aside from with the New Pornographers), she had a slide guitarist and an upright bass player with her, sans percussion except for an anklet tambourine. This time, she came out, and her back up band was The Sadies! For this set, Travis played the same guitar but played it primarily in slide guitar style (but held over his shoulder), which somehow involved twisting his right wrist as he strummed (Dave? Does that make sense?). She started playing solo with a creepy country waltz off one of her older albums, which I like and was a good intro. She played a few upbeat tunes, including a hot Loretta Lynn song that I didn’t know, but Jackie insisted she sounded just like Lynn, so OK. I thought it was pretty good, but mostly because the back up band was dead on. However, Neko played almost no other old stuff of hers; in fact, I can’t think of any others I recognized. It was all off the new album, I guess. Next to us was a young woman with Arista (I think) records, who apparently just signed Neko and so a lot of record label people were there. She was talking to a middle-aged man who apparently had directed the movie “Rock and Roll High School”. Weird. Anyway, perhaps Neko had to play mostly new album songs as part of the record deal or something. They were nice songs. But they were almost all sad country waltzes. In fact, she kept introducing songs as, “this is a sad song about X”. There were a few songs that she wrote with The Sadies, which didn’t fall into that category and were less depressing. But overall, it was too much of the same thing. Her voice sounded as good as always, but the lack of variety made her set pale in comparison to the previous one. Towards the end of the set (which wasn’t very long, probably because the first opener went on for so damn long), Dexter Roundblubber came out and “sang” with the band, with Neko as an additional rhythm guitar. He literally just growled unintelligibly into the microphone. I just didn’t get why anyone put up with this guy. For a few songs Neko played a small acoustic that was only slightly bigger than a ukulele. They did do a 5 or 6 song encore, which partially made up for the shorter set. Maybe the venue was just too big for her songs, which are small and intimate. But in the end, the night was all about The Sadies. I bought Neko’s new album – haven’t listened to it yet – but I think I’m more excited to hear the Sadies’ CD that Jackie picked up.
So there you have it. I couldn’t tell you what make of guitar or whatever everybody played (sorry, Dave – not as thorough as your Prince review). If Neko comes to town where you are, I’d go see her, but make sure you get there in time for the touring band.
-Larry
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