Tuesday, September 20, 2011

Okkervil River and Wye Oak Review / Twitter Tone Poem of Defunct Larryville Bands / New Sitcom of the Week: New Girl

Readers, it wasn't the most crowded show of the year, but Okkervil River's loyal following of sensitive and bookish types eventually showed up at the Granada last night to bask in Will Sheff's songwriting beneath a large banner of dog-faced people. The banner lit up at one point. That was pretty cool.

Baltimore duo Wye Oak kicked off at exactly nine in a near-empty Granada, rocking their LOUDquietLOUD dynamic that vacillated between shoegaze-y dream pop and furious guitar squalls. We preferred the quiet parts. They seemed like nice folks, and invited us all to the after-party at Jordan Geiger's house (but most of us weren't really invited).

Selfishly, we want Okkervil River to ONLY make dark concept albums about rock and roll culture and its fans, so their new record has left us a bit cold so far, keeping us slightly detached for much of their set despite its high energy level. However, some of the new songs rocked quite nicely in a live setting ("The Valley" was a highlight of the set). And by the time the show reached its stellar, closing one-two-three punch of "Our Life is Not a Movie or Maybe" and "Girl in Port" and "Unless It's Kicks," we were ready to show Sheff our hands, as he repeatedly requested.

Chip: "He meant that we should applaud, and I suspect he was making an oblique reference to Puck's final speech in A Midsummer Night's Dream: 'Give me your hands if we be friends.'"

Check out I Heart Local Music for a review and photos and videos over here

Highlights amongst the audience:

PBR Book Club co-president Bananasuit joined us for much of the set, carrying a copy of Cloud Atlas in her bag. Are you keeping up with the discussion? Lately, there are actually more boner jokes on that blog than there are here.

Hidden Pictures' Richard G. stopped by in the midst of Okkervil's set, muttered "I hate this band," and promptly stomped off.

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Readers, thanks to your submissions we've assembled another Twitter tone poem so you can revel in your nostalgia for the Larryville of yesteryear.

Topic: defunct Larryville bands (though a few of them may not be defunct or from Larryville).

We've edited a lot this time to make it "poetic," and we're sorry if we left your tweet out. It was probably an accident.

Enjoy!


The Sounds of Ancient Larryville

I miss every little punk band
that used to play anyplace
that would have them,
then broke up for no good reason.

SANTO GOLD

Zoom. Lawrence-centric songs. Absolute L-town shibboleths.

Coat Party
(minimal but frenetic dance machine)
and Bandit Teeth
(stage rotations and drunk/clever wordplay)

I miss shallow/the capsules.
And of course danger bob, bubble boys.
The urge.
So many.
Anyone recall the ray-guns?

The Micronotz.
Hellcat Trio had promotional panties.
Kill Creek.

I miss Frogpond and Justine Volpe in short plaid skirts.

Marry Me Moses! Origins in Family Reunion.

Transmittens, you were so twee!

Ad Astra Per Aspera
Noise control
Females rock too
Boo And Boo Too (Why?... vocal delay)
Danger Bob
The Bubble Boys
Getaway Driver
Kelpie
Butterglory
Panel Donor
Nuclear Family
& Vitreous Humor (it counts)

"The Embarrassment" (the Embos) frm Wichita
strong #lfk ties.
The best all-around art/garage band ever

"Get Smart!" was a great one.
Hypnotic, minimal, LOUD, danceable, funny, weird.

Ultimate Fakebook!
wildly unabashed downright wicked pop.

Save The Whales.
Girl/Guy horns.
The Costello bros.
Stony rhodes.
Poopy Pants.
Nothing could stop them but Japanese fishermen.

In ninety five there was a band called Margin Of Error.
They mostly played McCollum Hall.
They were okay.



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With a new sitcom on Fox beginning tonight, called "New Girl," Zooey Deschanel's status as scenester "IT" girl is surely in serious jeopardy, if not altogether over.

Chip: "I haven't beat off to a Fox sitcom since Arrested Development (Portia de Rossi), but there's a good chance that's about to change."

4 comments:

Nick said...

I have a Ray-Guns promo picture in a box down here somewhere. I was (am?) a ska kid.

Scary Manilow said...

No one misses The Donkey Show?

Johnny Hamms said...

No one remembers The Donkey Show - everyone drank themselves silly until they completely blacked out.

Richard said...

I wish I could have expressed my sentiments that succinctly during my time at Lawrence.com.