September 29, 2008
This May or May Not Disappoint You: Sunset Rubdown's Unofficial Aftershow
Canada, the Austin of North America, let loose its reigning metaphorical exporters at the Mohawk last night for a solid crowd enjoying an unusually crisp September night outdoors. They got everyone hot and bothered, opening with a new song called "Black Swan," as the vocals soared above 17 layers of sound, pleasing fans of a band whose lyrics demand audibility.
Despite a couple of comments about the heat (note to self: Canada is cold), and a member with a cold, Rubdown flew off the handle for the crowd favorites "Mending of the Gown," and "For the Pier...," with its faster tempo and a new set of lyrics on the back end. A handful of solid, new songs kept us on edge.
From records where songs roll literally one into the next, on Saturday the tunes started and stopped, as if for a meditating silence, before moving on. Although we'd prefer fewer stops, to help keep the emotional intensity buzzing, it's partly due to the flat-out-impressive game of musical instruments played by 3 of the five-piece, to rotate between guitar, bass, timpani, and drums. In exchange for that precision, there's not a lot of showmanship. Instead it feels like you're watching a secret science project being unleashed for the first time — it's not gonna explode with cock-rock machismo out of the box. The live show lives up to its front man's reputation as trending introvert, so that even though there's a good amount of banter back and forth, it often comes by way of apology or a thank you.
Krug & Co. ended with a mountainous and superior live version of "Stadiums and Shrines II," whose guitar and vocals brought catharsis and empathy to the late night air, so that when Krug absentmindedly sings "I’m sorry anybody dies at all these days," you believe him.
Worries of an Austin curfew brought it to a close shortly after midnight, after a one-song encore that caught a third of the crowd already out the door, forced to double back to hear "us ones in between." Even for those of weary mid-ACL feet, it was way worth the trouble.
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I was there, but sans camera, just unwinding. It was a GREAT show, the place was packed and Spencer was definitely "on".
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About the space in between songs thing - I think Krug puts so much into it, he has to take a break just to regain composure. I remember when I saw them spring 2007(?) at Emo's they played just over an hour, and when they came out to do an encore, Krug said "thank you, we don't usually do encores," and looked completely spent. He might have more endurance now, but I swear...that man puts some body into it.
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Yeah, you're totally right. There's no question the band, and Krug himself, are a really intense experience live. Their records are a bit of a roller coaster, hell, even their songs work like that, so reproducing it live is tough, and it comes across as heft and effort.
Anyone deserves a timeout after that; My main problem was that it gave me time to think about these fools next to me blowing cigarette smoke in my face, and reminding me that they were totally unable to shut-the-fuck-up during the whole set. Stuff like that sort of breaks the spell :)
I totally agree they play the shit out of every single song, and maybe it was just those circumstances, but it just feels like a few more transitions between songs would do their show good.