Your weekend is booked

St. Louis, sometimes you knock me out.

Have you heard about InFest STL yet? It's a two-day festival at 2720 on Cherokee Street focused on indie music. 2720's not necessarily the first venue I think of when I think of indie rock—and that's one reason this festival is such a pleasing surprise. The lineup on both days is totally legit, packed full of bands I've been wanting to see play together. Kudos to the team who put this thing together, and I'm looking forward to checking it out.

Here's the list of bands for tomorrow. There are two stages, upstairs and down, so there are a metric ton of acts:

DOWNSTAIRS:
3:20pm Burrowss
4:20pm Union Electric
5:20pm Send Money
6:20pm Music Embryo
7:20pm HUMDRUM
8:20pm Kid Scientist
9:20pm The Pass
10:20pm it!
11:20pm The Reverbs
12:20am Justin Torres' Loop Project

UPSTAIRS:
3pm Le' Ponds
4pm Eric Hall
5pm Dream Fox
6pm Superfun Yeah Yeah Rocketship
7pm Pretty Little Empire
8pm Sinfinis
9pm Ocean Rivals
10pm Franco-Hill
11pm 18andCounting
12am Goodness Gracious

See what I mean?! A couple of notes:
- Kid Scientist wrote and performed a rock opera last year. They're ambitious folks.
- Eric Hall is one of my favorite geniuses, instrumentally or otherwise.
- Ocean Rivals has some new songs. At last! Their first album, "Summer's Dogs," stands as one of my favorite STL albums of the last couple years, so new songs is very good news.
- If you haven't seen Franco-Hill yet, prepare to be impressed. The drummer has a casual mastery of his instrument that is inspiring, and the guitar/computer interface of the other guy is just killer. Thanks to Alexis for turning me onto them.
- Union Electric's been on a tear again, working up new songs and working towards some new releases.
- Pretty Little Empire has an EP in their back pocket that is going to make waves in 2013, just you wait.

I'll post Day Two tomorrow, but for now I suggest you come meet us down at 2720 and dance along to the celebration!
EVAN SULT 

REVIEW: Jeff Mangum and Tall Firs at the Sheldon, January 16

Slipping into my questionably legal parking spot, little green machine previewing the night's musical fare at high volume, I pull past a couple of fellas a few years younger than me. They all give me a thumbs up. I give it right back, not caring if it was meant sarcastically. There's no room for sarcasm tonight. Tonight is for merriment, and for the singing of songs: in less than an hour, Jeff Mangum, lead singer and principal songwriter of Neutral Milk Hotel, will be taking the stage at the acoustically stunning Sheldon Concert Hall. I hurry to the big front doors. Inside, a cornucopia of good-looking twenty- and thirty-somethings in their best flannel shirts and smart-looking glasses fill the bar area. The lights flicker to let us know that the opener, Oregon-based duo Tall Firs, is about to go on.

Tall Firs' songs combine the quieter moments in Sonic Youth's or Thurston Moore's catalog with hints of Bon Iver's folkiness, salted with a bit of Bruce Springsteen's grit. The crowd is here for someone else entirely, but the band holds its own with delicate, nostalgic songs. "We passed a lot of billboards and one said there was only one road to salvation," said Tall Fir Aaron Mullan, implying that maybe we were there to give it to them for the drive through God's country. Sleep deprived, I didn't expect their emanating wave of sullen electro-folk to hit me so hard. I float into a few waking dreams as they play their lullabies, and rouse 40 minutes later with Mullan's declaration: "This one is completely different, in that it's not all filled with metaphors for death." Hunh. Could've fooled me.

After a restless, charged intermission, Jeff Mangum steps onstage with an unassuming hello to the crowd. With green military cap atop long brown hair and beard, gray jeans and a Cosby sweater, he looks the part of an indie-rock Jesus—an effect not lessened when he commences the show with one of his masterworks, "Two Headed Boy Part I." The effect is so powerful it’s bittersweet, because "Two Headed Boy" was the first song I ever heard from Neutral Milk Hotel, and I realize as it starts that I'd been counting on the set building up to that crowning moment. Instead, I and everyone else in the completely packed house are brought straight to the heart of the music, thrilling to a cherished favorite song.

As that song ends, Mangum pauses to put us all at ease, giving us permission to sing along with him. Revelation! The Sheldon is a venerable venue for an intimate performance, and we started under its influence. But with Mangum's blessing, we're free to react to these songs in person the way we do at home, joyfully giving our best impression of people trying to lose our voices to such favorites as "The King of Carrot Flowers" and "Holland, 1945." Together we plow through most of The Aeroplane Over the Sea, with a few nods to debut album On Avery Island, and one or two recently released box-set rarities such as "O, Sister."  Four songs in, Mangum lets us know that we're welcome to come closer, to hang out with him up front and on the stage itself. The crowd's bravery grows as the night progresses, with Mangum playing the part of singing summer counselor around the campfire. He leads the squeaky wheels with the right dose of grease and indifference when someone gets out of line. The long night only becomes more intimate and more cozy, until finally the crowd, fully emboldened by the encore of "In the Aeroplane Over the Sea," sings in a therapeutic bloodletting of some 800 heart muscles.

After a quick thanks for joining him, Mangum quickly but politely departs to escape a torrent of fanboys and girls eager for an autograph, guitar pick or half-drunk bottle of water. Among the seats and in the bar, everyone seems to be hugging everyone else. Ok fine—I get caught up in it a bit too, but it was an unbelievable show, and we shared it together, these songs previously sung only to the dashboards of our cars and the deaf ears of our neighbors in traffic. We were the Neutral Milk Hotel choir for this evening, and our pleasure is evident as we head for the door. Those billboards leading to St. Louis must've known something about the show ahead. Maybe a good show can't cure all the ills of the world, but when a few hundred St. Louisans sang with Jeff Mangum, we found all the salvation we needed.

BY JEREMY PEVNICK

REVIEW: Father John Misty & Magic Trick Jan. 8 at Firebird

photo by Maximilla Lukacs 

Let us talk about Father John Misty—he of the gyrations and animal noises, the Vegas caricatures and the effortless confidence, renowned as much for his online dance clips as his granulated, handsome voice.
Misty walked onstage to an eager audience. “Oh, this is going to be too easy,” he chuckled. Yeah, it probably was. But the crowd's attention spurred on Misty’s candor. However self-indulgent his performances are, it pays to remember that Father John Misty, née Joshua Tillman, has a voice that levels the folk genre and arrives with a highly calibrated backing band.

In the set’s opener, “Fun Times in Babylon,” to a packed crowd enthralled into silence, Misty strolled around The Firebird stage, reveling in the steadiness and rustic quality of his own voice. However wistful, though, it soaks up attention.

Misty played the crowd as his true instrument. Pausing before the last stanza in "Look Out Hollywood Here I Come," he hushed the crowd with a single finger to his lips, bent his six-foot frame down to scoop up his trusty tambourine, slapped it once so it rang into the heavy silence, waited for the laugh, and swung back into the song with the panache of a '70s lounge singer.

The two gentlemen on either side of me exchanged glances. “I’m in love with him,” one confessed. The other nodded.

Misty, live and in the flesh, lives up to every video of him captured online. With karaoke dramatics, sudden dance steps, and ad-libbed lyrics, his performance unfolds as much between the songs as during them. He got his first belly laughs when he held his O'Fallon IPA aloft, read the label's boast about a 2008 prize, and ran a quick vocal sketch: "Do you think this beer ever gets drunk and walks around the bar?" he wondered. "Like, 'Back in 2008 I was the best beer in St. Louis! Those were the days…'" He described his old days of waking up on the couch all too often to the endless loop of a Lord of the Rings DVD menu, then later introduced his band in terms of Lord of the Rings characters, introducing the crowd to Gimli on guitar ("well, it's the axe," he said, gesturing at the instrument), Gollum lurking behind the keys…

Misty's touring crew was top notch, especially former Ambulance LTD guitarist Benji Lysaght. While care-taking the original versions, the band added additional voicings, filling out Misty's already ardent aesthetics with their own hidden inspirations. Under their power, “I’m Writing a Novel” had the swing of a '60s surf-pop number, with a new added background riff that bumped elbows with The Monkee’s “I’m a Believer.” Lysaght added a layer of authoritative distortion to “Hollywood Forever Cemetery Sings" while maintaining the song’s necromanical roots.

With the band secured, Misty has room to throw himself around the stage. He dances with abandon, like a white girl trying to be sexy, swinging his hips left and right like a biological imperative. In his previous solo work—billing himself as J. Tillman—he was less cowboy disco than his current work, and lacking any of Misty's dramatic flair. As Tillman he could sing just as beautifully, but as Father John Misty he expresses himself in a way that suggests interpretive dance. He can certainly put on a show.

The two-song encore began with “I Love You, Honeybear,” in which he explicitly refers to his days as J. Tillman, Misty performed with just Lysaght on guitar, then crooned his way into Canned Heat’s “On the Road Again.” His dance moves reappeared: hands thrown above his head, Misty threw himself to his knees repeatedly, shaking his head like he was trying to feel his brain hit the walls of his skull.

I've never seen anything like it.
BLAIR STILES 

Setlist:
Fun Times in Babylon
Only Son of the Ladiesman
Nancy From Now On
I’m Writing a Novel
Misty’s Nightmares 1 & 2
Sally Hatchet
Well, You Can Do It Without Me
Now I’m Learning to Love the War
Tee Pees 1-12
Everyman Needs a Companion
Hollywood Forever Cemetery Sings
Encore:
I Love You, Honeybear
On the Road Again (Canned Heat cover)

REVIEW: Japandroids, Swearin’ Nov. 20 at the Firebird

Three years after Vancouver, BC’s Japandroids arrived to pummel  the Billiken Club, the duo of guitarist/lead vox Brian King and drummer/vox David Prowse returned to St. Louis to burn down the Firebird.

I walked through the front door and into a dark, milky fog that made it impossible to see more than five feet in any direction. I could just make out the audience: several couples, a father and daughter team, but mostly men in that familiar 18-28 range. The thick air was hotter than Satan’s taint and humid as Florida swampland…which was actually a welcome respite from the fall chill of St. Louis waiting just outside the door.

Japandroids brought along Brooklyn/Pittsburgh pop-punk outfit Swearin’ as their openers. The four piece strolled on stage well after their supposed start time, but whatever—no one in the audience seemed to care about the wait. They kicked off with “What a Dump,” from their 2011 cassette with the same name and, as one might hope from a pair of singers who also date, Allison Crutchfield and Kyle Gilbride share vocal and guitar duties well together. It was apparent Crutchfield is more reserved than Gilbride (who resembles Ben Folds in all aspects of attire and physical traits), but she bites, too. “Kenosha,” off 2012’s self-titled LP, is a damned good kiss-off to an ex-lover, and Crutchfield brought the right brass to the refrain, “I hope you like Kenosha so much you stay there.” I feel you, girl.

Gilbride sings in a bratty tone that never turns cacophonous. He sounds like a lovable little brother who insists on tagging along as the older kids roam the town. The two singers work in dissimilar tones and keys from one another, so their back-and-forth lead vocals propelled their double-digit opening set along swiftly—I'll be damned if it wasn't the swiftest 40 minutes I've ever experienced.

Japandroids' Brian King soundchecked with that signature Canadian vernacular: “EH, EH, EH, EH!” he hollered into the mic. The pretty redhead-in-a-bottle next to me took pictures of King with her phone. “I’ve got to get a picture of that face!,” she said breathlessly. Indeed, King looked like a dapper Highness of Rock N’ Roll Frivolity with his white button-down and flattering black jeans. But it was his stage banter, improvised when Prowse busted his kick pedal before the band even got through their first song, that won the night: he told jokes. JOKES. “Why don’t hipsters make good lovers?" he asked the crowd. "They lost their seven inches.” “Why don’t lobsters share? ...They’re shellfish.” Bless his charming, charming soul.

Pedal fixed, and King having stolen the hearts of everyone hot-blooded female in the room, Japandroids got wild—as promised. They hurled themselves into “Adrenaline Nightshift,” King’s veins raised and visible in his taut forearms, and Prowse endangering every nerve leading to his cranium with his violent head thrashing.

Japandroids went feral. King threw his “you”s to the crowd during “Art Czars,” pointing at a different face with every pronoun. The guitar riff from “Hearts Sweat” (from 2009’s Post-Nothing) somersaulted over Prowse’s sinuous drumwork and sounded dangerous, like thunder in a black sky. Prowse's strong voice led “Rockers East Vancouver," and King kept his promise to "dance my fucking ass off!" Mosh pits stormed and passed during the 17-song set. "This is a fucking jam, if you know what I mean," said King by way of introducing their version of Mclusky's "To Hell with Good Intentions." He challenged the crowd to “keep up,” but no one could match King’s frenetics. Didn't stop us trying though, and the whole night felt like a late-entry highlight of the year. When King asked if they wanted “two or three” more songs, every hand was raised with four to ten fingers raised.


Setlist:
Adrenaline Nightshift
Fire’s Highway
Art Czar’s
The Boys Are Leaving Town
The Nights of Wine and Roses
Rockers East Vancouver
Younger Us
Heart Sweats
Wet Hair
Evil’s Sway
The House That Heaven Built
Crazy/Forever
Sovereignty
Continuous Thunder
To Hell With Good Intentions (Mclusky cover)
Young Hearts Spark Fire
For the Love of Ivy (Gun Club cover)

Delta Spirit w/ JEFF the Brotherhood at the Pageant

Check out new photos by Micah Mickles of Delta Spirit with JEFF the Brotherhood at the Pageant. Click here for the full set.

Delta Spirit, photo Micah Mickles 

JEFF the Brotherhood, photo Micah Mickles

REVIEW: Regina Spektor, The Pageant 11/8

Regina Spektor, Only Son 

Thursday, November 8

The Pageant

Regina Spektor graced St. Louis with her ever-adorable presence in support of her recent studio release, What We Saw From the Cheap Seats on Thursday, November 8. Without having any overly elaborate set-up or production, she and her modest 3-piece back-up band wowed a sold-out crowd at The Pageant. Opening for Spektor was Only Son, the moniker of singer/songwriter Jack Dishel, who also happens to be Spektor’s husband. Pretty adorable, right?

Photo by Micah Mickles

Dishel lived up to his stage name by going solo on this tour (though he does frequently play with some back-up musicians, who can be found on the recent Only Son album Searchlight). He came out and played a heartfelt and intimate opening song, then paused to introduce his “band”: a lone iPod, glowing on the stool beside him. Dishel’s stage presence remained awkwardly charming throughout, and his dark, curly white-guy ‘fro and leather jacket made him look a little like a young Bob Dylan. Even when he pulled out an occasional (well-received) quip, he came off as a pretty shy, soft-spoken fellow. His only weakness was probably his “band”—while they were totally spot-on musically and it all sounded great (I mean, it damn well better), there was just some sort of element or chemistry that was lacking on those songs. There were even a couple of songs where his guitar was so well-mixed with the iPod, he might very well have had his volume down, and we’d never be any the wiser. His solo songs were awesome, though. He mentioned mid-set that the last time he’d played in STL, it was at the Creepy Crawl. There was a cheer from the crowd, though mostly from folks over 21. He plugged the video for his last song of the set by telling us to go watch it because he pisses off Macaulay Culkin in it. Hell, I’m sold—Dishel seemed like a cool guy and, iPod aside, he really is a great musician and songwriter.

After the crew painstakingly hauled out and arranged Regina Spektor’s huge, shining, gorgeous Steinway piano, Spektor walked directly out to center stage and took hold of the microphone. Her first lyrics, on “Ain’t No Cover,” were sung a cappella, and the only sound in all the Pageant, besides her hauntingly beautiful, grandiose voice, was her index finger gently tapping on the microphone. Spektor then took her seat at the piano, and her backing musicians joined her onstage. They had a pretty simple set-up: a cellist and keyboard player seated downstage from Spektor, and a drummer tucked so far stage right and behind a clear drum shield that he was out of view from his side of the balcony. 

Five songs in, the band set into the instrumental opening to “Small Town Moon,” and Spektor opened her mouth to start singing but stopped all at once. In her shy, demure speaking voice, she apologized for stopping the song, explaining sheepishly that she got freaked out by one photographer’s cameras up front, which was doing a “scary rapid-fire photo thing.” And you could tell she didn’t want to yell at anyone but rather make it seem like she was the one who was being inconvenient—it was all very sweet and humanizing, rather than what could have easily turned into a rock’n’roll asshole moment with words chosen less carefully. She modestly encouraged the photographers to please keep taking lots of pictures, but maybe not rapid fire, if they wouldn’t mind. The crowd all just wanted to give her a big hug—only Spektor could make a show glitch so sweet and endearing. 

She went old school for a couple songs, then returned to newer material. Midway through “Eet” she lost track of some lyrics (which I’d been warned was not uncommon for Spektor), but she laughed it off and jumped right back in without missing a beat on the piano. As that song concluded, she stood up from the piano to welcome Dishel back up, and they met center stage for a beautiful duet, “Call Them Brothers,” that can be found on Only Son’s album. “The Prayer,” which followed, was sung in its original Russian lyrics, and then Spektor made her way across the stage to a previously untouched keyboard to jump into “Dance Anthem of the ‘80s.” She returned to the Steinway for another handful or so of songs before ending a great set that touched a decent, though not overwhelming, expanse of her career. She and the band returned for a four-song encore, ending on “Samson,” one of her slower, more serious songs, and leaving the crowd charmed and pleased not only by Spektor’s gorgeous music, but by her quirky, girl-next-door stage presence.

By Suzie Gilb

REVIEW: Electric Six / Little Hurricane / Girls 2021

Tuesday, November 6 at the Firebird

“My people need a place to go,” says hyper-throated frontman Dick Valentine in one of Electric Six’s finer songs, “Down At McDonnellzz.” That place was the fabulous Firebird, the venue of choice for this band of misfit rock stars, which has become their de facto home when they come through the STL. This time through they brought Girls 2021 and Little Hurricane, two stellar groups whose dynamite opening sets were unfortunately timed, due to the proximity of both a national presidential election and the utterly palpable anticipation surrounding Electric 6’s set. That’s not to say that Girls 2021’s hyped-up indie rock and Little Hurricane’s boy/girl blues blasts didn't garner applause and audience response, but it was obvious to everyone that both the election and the headliner were making it hard for folks to concentrate.

When Dick Valentine took the stage, speaking in a perfectly reasonable voice, it took a moment to recognize him. Where was the bombastic character that he portrays on all of Electric Six’s impressive output—already at six albums, with a live record and another new album on the way? It wasn't until opener “Crazy Horses” blared out of the gate that Valentine's true voice was revealed.

Once the horses were out of the proverbial barn, Valentine growled, cackled, shouted and sang some of the most self-aware meta-rock tunes out there. From songs of bawdy behavior (“I Buy The Drugs”), rock n roll excess and general mayhem (“Danger! High Voltage”) and so on, Electric Six could be mistaken for indie rock’s Spinal Tap, if it weren’t for the fact that they seem tomean it. You get the feeling that the band might actually, for example, set fire to a Taco Bell or give out a P.O. box where you can request drugs from their lead singer. But around those self-aware, winking, ironic-or-not? lyrics are ironsided rock songs, so when the band drops into the shuffling keyboards of “Newark Airport Boogie,” you’re dancing and laughing simultaneously as Dick Valentine shouts, “Here’s the part where everybody breaks into song!” In the middle of a song. 

But the band doesn’t just do meta-commentary; it has its fair share of shock-value moments too. “She’s White” would make The Darkness blush, despite not being actually vulgar.  Even if it’s not autobiographical, “I Buy The Drugs” probably makes the cops check Dick extra careful when they pull the band over. That’s to say nothing of their biggest hit, “Gay Bar,” which culminates with the lyric, “I’ve got something to put in you / at the gay bar.” Ew.

It says something about Electric Six's sense of humor that they not only say what they say, but that the audience gets pulled into the band's rock n roll reality. This conversion happens courtesy of sheer hard work on the part of drummer Percussion World, keyboard slayer Tait Nucleus? (sic),  guitarists Johnny Nischal and The Colonel, and bassist Smorgasbord (who also gets the coffee, apparently). The band behind Valentine’s bluster backs it up with classic rock guitars and keyboards tuned to make you dance. Basic four-on-the-floor rock in a setting like the Firebird would sound kind of out of place—the ‘Bird is mostly known as a place for freak-folk, indie hip-hop, metal and all flavors of out-there music—but the regal rock legacy that precedes Electric Six is almost a show unto itself.

 The crowd was full of first-timers and lifers both, with each taking in the spectacle and getting their dancing orders from Dick, The “Dance Commander.” The set was peppered with semi-hits (“Gay Bar”, “High Voltage”) and obscure cuts including new songs (one of which I believe was called “I Am A Song!”) from their new album. This was the band’s 4^th time to the Firebird in 2 years and the end of their current tour in support of their last record “Zodiac” before working on the new album. Such a tireless treadmill of productivity would destroy lesser bands but this is Electric 6 we’re talking about. They’ve built themselves a castle in the ever-shifting sands of fickle indie rock and the thing they do is just keep building new foundations, stacking their ouvre higher and higher until such a towering series of albums and shows and songs is their legacy in and of itself. It can take a toll. What many in the crowd may not have been aware of, was that guitarist The Colonel was heading on to other projects leaving the leads in the hands of the estimable Da Ve. But with such a fiery frontman and a deep deck of players, his absence was barely noticed. The show, after all, must go on.

by Jason Robinson