I saw Spoon and Mary Timony yesterday live for the first time and they both didn't disappoint. While Spoon has only hit my musical radar this year, I've been casually familiar with Mary Timony since her Helium days. It was great to finally see her live(and adorable as ever, I'd like to add). Mary opened the show, performing as The Mary Timony Band. In actuality it was just Mary on vocals/guitar and her drummer. I wasn't expecting a duo setup but in the end I was quite impressed how full their sound was. It was a joy to watch the kinetic drumming style of the drummer and it was interesting to watch how Mary and her drummer fed off each other's energy. Songs straddled the line between Sleater Kinney-ish style rockers propelled by the drummer's manic drumming and Mary's urgent guitar work, and artier pop-rock numbers featuring Mary's imaginative guitar arrangements and dry vocals which were reminiscnent of her work with her old band, Helium. While the crowd was thin at the start of her set, as more people filtered into the club, it seemed the crowd got more into it. In addition to her own material, she also did a fantastic version of a Richard Hell song called "I'm Your Man". After seeing Spoon's fantastic performance yesterday at The Phoenix, I'm wondering why it took me so long to discover this great band. I picked up their album "Gimme Fiction" earlier this year, the day it was released in Canada, based mainly on the recommendations of music blogs and the music press, and since then it's slowly been seeping its way into my subconscious. It's a good album, for sure. Simply put, Spoon were fantastic yesterday and their set just about clinched it for me that "Gimme Fiction" will end up as my favourite album of 2005. While the "Gimme Fiction" songs were my favourites yesterday(I thinked they played most of if not all of the songs from the album), in general, I found their whole set to be inspiring. Britt Daniel had a wonderful ragged voice that fit quite nicely along side the danceable rock rhythms and effortlessly performed melodies. The "Gimme Fiction" songs didn't deviate much from the album but that's more an observation rather than a criticism. The band displayed a genuine enthusiasm that was fully illustrated by frontman Britt Daniel's soul-man-like physical dexterity onstage. While musically they were superb overall, the electric piano on "Beast and Dragon, Adored" didn't quite meet the awesomeness of a live piano which I believe they used on the album. Overall, I enjoyed the melodic keyboard arrangements and was pleased to see the keyboardist add some maracas and additional guitar arrangements to the fold. Although I was near the front of the stage, my view was partially obstructed by some taller people so while I managed to get some good photos, I also missed some good photo opportunities. C'est la vie.
The live show only proved how 'pure' their songs are. Crowd enthusiasm was high and I saw a number of people singing along to almost every word. The danceabilty(or at least grooveability) of their music is probably one factor that appeals to the hipper indie crowd. However the nitty gritty of it all is that their melodies and arrangements are so damn irresistible. Who else could cop a "Miss You"-era Rolling Stones influence and get away with it?
[photos from the show]
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Jason Collett will be at Lee's Palace on December 10th with openers Paso Mino. [via Emerge]
The New Pornographers performed a live session for BBC 6 Music's Gideon Coe yesterday, performing songs "Use It" and "Bones of an Idol". Listen to the session here(session starts around the 20:40:00 mark; program is only archived for a week).
Listen to/watch the live session The Magic Numbers did for Morning Becomes Eclectic yesterday.
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