The Go! Team Live
Tonight, or last night, or Monday night if you prefer, I went to see The Go! Team in concert. I’ve blogged about them before. What a fabulous band, and what a fabulous live act. Bill, who came along at the last minute because James couldn’t make it had never heard them before and was duly impressed that there wasn’t a single weak song in the whole set. Perhaps a compare and contrast is in order: the support acts were abysmal, but for quite different reasons. The Reasearch had a highly developed sense of melody and harmony, and all three were accomplished singers. But they were just lousy musicians. They kney how to craft a song but just didn’t know how to play one. Dungen on the other hand, were highly accomplished musicians who apparently knew nothing about singing, melody, harmony, or even the vaguaries of constructing a song. As Adam remarked, they sounded like The Muppets doing King Crimson cover versions. The Go! Team had none of their failings, all of their accomplishments, and more: frankly dazzling muti-instrumentalism was on display by most members of the band, and all of the songs managed to have the musical simplicity of great songs combined with their adeptness in a multitude of musical genres all seemingly impossibly played at once (Sonic Youth meets The Jackson 5 as one reviewer put it). On top of that they manage to be remarkable showmen. And, least imporantly of all, their drummer is not only good (which is surprisingly difficult if you have the unfortunate disadvantage of being a girl) but a total cutie. Bang bang chicken.
