That Boy's A Wild One: Frog Eyes, Alex Delivery, and The Henry Clay People @ Spaceland May 5, 2007

Surprises can be awesome. Case in point: on Spaceland's calendar for the lineup tonight only 2 bands were listed. But surprise! There was a third band in the lineup tonight: The Henry Clay People, who I missed at the Spires show a couple weeks back due to extreme illness. However, surprises can also suck, like the fact that the club stayed fairly NOT PACKED for the entire show. I'm still not sure why people have not latched on to Frog Eyes yet. Is it cause they're Canadian?

The Henry Clay People are local and play all over but I always seem to miss them. I seemed to miss their introduction and didn't find out who they were till almost the end. But, the entire time they played, I kept thinking, 'this band is awesome'. Their sound is the indie rock I grew up on in the late nineties, but it doesn't sound old. They were a fun band who was enjoyable to watch cause they all looked like they wanted to be there playing, which more bands should do.

The Jagjaguwar label puts out some pretty reputable bands, bands I like to listen to very often (Okkervil River, Swan Lake, Ladyhawk). Alex Delivery is the band they seem to be really pushing right now. I heard ONE song before I went to this show and thought it was ok. OH, but live they were different, in a not-so-good way. There was a weird cross between 'jam music' and electronic that I found disagreeable. Not to mention that one chick's job was just to hit a block and make jangly noises. 10 minutes into the set and we left. They were still playing the first song.

The Frog Eyes' set was super. I wish I could think of a better word to describe it right now but I can't. Maybe super fantastic, but that sounds a bit tarded. Anyways, this time I tried to be very dilligent and make a note of the songs they played. Alas, when I checked my notes later, all written in pencil, in the dark mind you, there was just a #2 smudged mess written on top of some crap I needed to remember to pick up from the grocery store. Ah well. They did cover many news songs off their album Tears of the Valedictorian, including: Idle Songs, Stockades, Eagle Energy, Bushels and some older ones that have long names I can't remember. Again I was amazing with the ferocity that Carey Mercer exudes while playing/singing. It's such a sharp contrast to when he is announcing songs or chit chatting with the audience. Even walking around prior to the show, he seemed very small and introverted. But when he starts to shriek lyrics, his groaning escalating to a falsetto and back again, he becomes much larger and carries the entire band behind him.

The set up this time was the four piece minus keys. I guess the only thing that could have made the set extra super would have been to have Spencer Krug on keys, who complements Mercer's performance with his own erratic playing. But he was with Sunset Rubdown in Boston this night. Anyways, the set sounded a bit 'harder' than they usually do, more 'rock' with out the electronic noises that sporadically pop up in their tunes. This is not a bad aspect though, just different.

I think if I keep writing, it will just be a gush of how much I admire and love this band. So, I'll end this right here, urging everyone to go and show some respect to our cousins up north. Cause Canadians can rock too.

At Last! The Canadians Are Here! Wolf Parade and Frog Eyes at the Wiltern Friday August 25,2006

8 months. It's been 8 months since I missed the last Wolf Parade show. And even though I built this show up for that long, it was still as awesome as I thought it would be.

If you've never been to the Wiltern, it looks as if it was a really fancy place about 60 years ago. There's some remaining architectural details that make it look pretty fancy, but a woman's bathroom with only 3 stalls.... dude, who are we kidding??? I'm also quite miffed about the upstairs/downstairs/limited "pit" seating arrangement. I waiting too long to buy tickets, so I ended up in the "upstairs" seating arrangement, where people SAT through the rockin' performances. People, please, it's a fast paced musical show. You don't "sit". You stand and head bob, come on!!!!

Missed the first band so I couldn't tell you the name. However, out in the bar, there are tvs where you can sit and watch the performances, that was kinda cool. Second on was Frog Eyes, which I started listening to when I found out the lead singer, Carey Mercer, was part of the band Swan Lake (which included Spencer Krug from Wolf Parade and Dan Bejar- WOAH! is right!)- who are set to release their first album out on Jagjaguwar Records in November. Anyway, they jump-started their set with "The Oscillator's Hum" (which just minutes before I was telling my friend that if they played that one song, I'd be happy, and they did, so I was). The tempo was different from the recorded version; here it slowed down and sped up quite abruptly. From there the whole 45 minute or so set just took off at full steam with Mercer screaming and whispering his highs and lows with the band backing him up like kids crashing through a kitchen banging on pots and pans. Unfortunately the crowd wasn't into it that much, well, one kid in the pit was dancing all by himself, but other than that I don't think they knew what to do here. I just wanted to smack them and shout "Look, there, THAT is good music. Pay attention and stop fucking talking over the music." When Mercer did talk back to the crowd ("Could whoever keeps yelling shit please stop, I don't understand."), this small voice addressed them, a complete contrast to the roar that he let's out when singing. The last song was what finally drew the crowd in. They were able to build the song up and take the crowd along with them, and at that point I think they may have won the audience over.

When Wolf Parade came on, I think the crowd was finally just happy to SEE them. Spencer Krug, who played the keys during the entire Frog Eyes set, was not showing any signs of weariness and was practically hopping all over his larger setup. Other lead singer, Dan Boeckner, was playing this or that games with the crowd in between songs (Who would you rather be stuck with[locked in a room or something- can't remember] Les Claypool or Ani Difranco?-- I think I was just as surprised as him when they cheered on Ani. In reality, I'm sure many of these kids are too young to know who Les Claypool is). With all kidding and playing aside, the set was incredible. They played almost everything off of Apologies to the Queen Mary (maybe even all of it.) and some old stuff. Also included in the set was some new material which seemed to be taking another direction then this previous album. There was a mellow, jazz influence through some of the new songs, and Spencer even took up the guitar for a couple. Highlights were I'll Believe In Anything, which received many many cries from the audience including myself (this is my favorite tune from them, listening to it puts me in an almost transcendent state- really, it's that good, maybe it's the drums) and the last song of the encore, Dinner Bells, which they kept going on with till it seemed the point of exhaustion. I think everyone heaved a sigh when it was finished.

And now another long wait until they're back. At least the six other side projects will more than likely be touring sometime this fall.