Frankly, I’m getting tired of driving all the way out to Chapel Hill, all by myself, so I can stand there looking like a non-bearded version of the weird old guy who hung out by himself at the shows I went to when I was younger. But I wasn’t going to miss this show, not after the effort I expended the last time I went to see Le Tigre at Cat’s Cradle (see the December archives for my highly amusing write-up on that experience).
Beth’s parents weren’t in town yet, so we didn’t have a babysitter. I couldn’t get Dave to go because he was out of town caring for his dying mother, and there was no way I was going to subject Larry to that racket again. I lobbied hard to get Jacob, my 26-year old gay boss, to go with me (he definitely represents a key demographic for this lineup). But he works too hard – WAY too hard for a guy his age – and wasn’t about to go out and have fun on a Wednesday night, for heaven’s sake.
So it was me, alone, again.
Sigh.
I was kinda cranky when I got there. Not only had I left my wedding ring on the edge of the bathroom sink (I take it off when I wash my hands sometimes), but I left my wallet home as well. I told the guy at the door who was carding me and the other the young lesbians I didn’t have my wallet, but I assured him (with a dorky grin) I was 21. “Why I even bother to stamp you, you cain’t buy nothin’ anyway?” he replied, with a bemused snicker. Good point, I thought. Good point.
I staked my claim to a little patch of floor about three feet from the stage. Somehow, the show had sold out in the two months since the last show was cancelled, and the crowd was getting thick well before the opening act came onstage.
And what an act it was! Four short people (three guys and a gal who looked about 14) all walked out on stage and did calisthenics for a full minute before getting down to business. They were wearing dork/gay athletic wear – the kind of stuff you’d expect male figure skaters to wear to the gym on days when all they want is a light workout.
The bespectacled Asian guy started fiddling with his PowerBook, and Will, the one with the multicolored embroidered cloth “leaves” adorning his shoulder, grabbed the microphone and started to do his best Justin Timberlake impression. The other two executed choreographed gay/dork dance moves behind Will. It was quite a sight.
hey willpower did their best to coax me out of my crank – I just couldn’t help but smile at the sheer gay geekiness of it all. Will danced and moonwalked and shook his pelvis like the guy in Jamiroquai, and the tunes – in the grand tradition of fey keyboardist/singer duos like
Yazoo, Bronski Beat, etc. – were irresistably catchy! I loved this act! I loved every bit of it! I became a fan, right there, on that spot!
But something nagged me about them – the songs had a certain sort of catchiness I’d heard somewhere before. Hard to explain it exactly, but what I’m talking about is quite distinctive. The next day I did a bit of web sleuthing and found out that Will is, in fact, Will Schwartz, member of one of my favorite catchy indie rock acts ever: Imperial Teen. Which explains a lot. hey willpower basically sounds like Imperial Teen if they made groovy R&B instead of whatever it is they do now. Which means, basically, I’ll be buying the record next time I have my wallet where they’re selling the CDs
Like I said, I was feeling pretty good from hey willpower’s 30-minute set when Lesbians On Ecstasy came out and stomped on my buzz, hard. While they were tolerable as background music to a game of pool the last time I saw them, they were simply ponderous when my full attention was directed at them. Their 45-minute set couldn’t end quickly enough. My description from last time is still accurate (again, refer to my earlier write-up), but throw in a little too much mid-80s Belgian techno in the mix as well. And the leather biker outfits were simply repulsive. Two thumbs down.
You can imagine, then, I was cranky again by the time Le Tigre took the stage. Kathleen immediately apologized for getting sick the last time, then joked she was really playing PlayStation in the tour bus the whole time. Ha! She made a funny!
Le Tigre was one of my favorite acts last year at Coachella, even though I enjoyed them by myself (do you see a pattern?) while Beth and Cross instead watched a corpulent Robert Smith sleepwalk through Staring At The Sea, on a Jumbotron. At Coachella, the large stage, the coordinated outfits, and the HUGE video screen made their act seem like a huge celebration of punk feminism, to which everyone was invited. At the Cradle, with a cramped stage, small screen (obscured even further by a large-headed photographer who felt perfectly comfortable leaning into my sight line every two minutes or so), and lackluster outfits, Le Tigre was merely fun. But they belted through nearly the same set I had seen in
Palm Springs with a reasonable amount of energy and competence. It was a fine show. Perfectly fine.
I was struck by a realization about them (and not that the sex, drugs, & rock’n’roll is starting to wear a bit on the once-hot Kathleen [just watch her prance around in Sonic Youth’s Bull In Heather video, and you’ll see what I mean by “once-hot”]): while I like most of their stuff, I really only
love the material from their first CD. In their main set, they played two cuts from that CD: “Hot Topic” and “What’s Yr Take On Cassavettes?” Those two songs were SO much stronger than the newer stuff. With all the focus on the new stuff, I got to worrying they wouldn’t play “Deceptacon,” the best song on their best album.
But the encore sent me home smiling (again). First, their kitschy cover of “I’m So Excited,” replete with cheerleader dance moves and Kathleen’s mumble/scream of the chorus (reminds me of Johnny Rotten’s take on “Roadrunner” back in the day), stoked the crowd into a seething frenzy. Then, finally, they did “Deceptacon,” performed entirely without instruments (as was most of the show), karaoke style, winding up with Kathleen and Jo screaming “…see you later …see you later” as the lights went up and the girls bounced off the stage.
Yes, the drive home was a good one, especially because I didn’t get pulled over. With my wallet sitting home on the kitchen counter, that would’ve sucked.