Metric @ the 9:30 Club
The morning after seeing Toronto’s Metric, I had a brief water-cooler conversation with a co-worker who had caught the band the last time they rolled through town. “I've always been surprised how quickly that band blew up,” he said. “It seems like they got huge almost overnight.” I nodded in agreement, having seen them fill a 1,200-capacity club the night prior. After giving the matter some thought, however, I realized that Metric’s rise to the top of the indie pops really isn’t that surprising at all. At this point, cynics might be tempted to point to the band’s willingness to license their songs for commercial use (including multiple plays on the post-O.C. tastemaker Grey’s Anatomy) or their close affiliation with other popular Canadian acts (Broken Social Scene, Stars). While there’s no denying that these sorts of tactics have helped expose the band to a wider audience, to accuse Metric of “selling out” is to ignore one fundamental truth: Metric makes—and has always made—extremely accessible pop music. From Emily Haines’ clever yet straightforward lyrics to the band’s catchy, hook-laden arrangements, Metric has always sounded like a band destined for bigger things.
Crystal Castles, on the other hand, seem destined to live out their days in relative, albeit hip, obscurity. The young Canadian duo has everything going for them in terms of credibility—a deal with French electronic imprint Kitsuné, effusive write-ups from Pitchfork and remixes of everyone from Bloc Party to Ed Banger rabble-rouser Uffie—but could stand to work on their performance. Multi-instrumentalist Ethan Fawn was the first to take the stage, building up layers of chirps and beeps until they sounded like a choir of R2 units. This noise eventually gave way to a blunt drum machine beat, some gurgling 8-bit synths and an auxiliary rhythm pounded out on a set of live drums. At this point, single-named vocalist Alice emerged from the side of the stage, grabbed the microphone and started yelling like it was the old 9:30 Club. After the first verse, she started removing her clothing layer-by-layer, until she had stripped down to a T-shirt and skirt. She then proceeded to grab one of the two strobe lights sitting at the front of the stage (the band’s only lighting) and brandished it like a weapon, shining it into the eyes of the front row.
These sorts of theatrics usually draw an audience into a performance, but Alice’s second-rate Karen O posturing only underlined the struggle between her confrontational vocals and the musical backdrop that she often drowned out. While Crystal Castles’ compositions were consistently engaging—think Ladytron but noisier or a more spastic version of the Faint—Alice’s hardcore-style vocals and upstaging antics did little to build upon the band’s arrangements. Crystal Castles certainly have a lot of potential, but for now they’re just putting the “clash” in electroclash.
Photos by Mehan Jayasuriya
Following Crystal Castles’ set—which seemed to leave the majority of the room scratching their heads—you would think that Metric would want to get right down to business. No so: the band chose to devote most of the first half of their set to new songs from their forthcoming, as-yet-unnamed album. While these tunes were not without their charm, the first portion of the set felt a bit murky and indistinct. Compounding this problem was the fact that no one seemed to recognize any of the new songs, which resulted in a pretty tepid audience response. Given Metric’s reputation for energetic live shows, it seems more than likely that the new songs simply haven’t had enough time to gel quite yet.
Luckily, Metric more than lived up to their reputation during the show’s second half. “Did the new shit freak you out?” Haines asked jokingly at one point. The slinky “Poster of a Girl” found the band warming up their chops; the next number, “Dead Disco,” got both the band and audience moving. Despite her delicate-looking garb--a black and white sequined dress--Haines let loose with a few bicycle kicks before leaning out into the crowd, squeezing the microphone stand suggestively between her knees. Live it Out opener “Empty” built up slowly, with James Shaw’s reverb-soaked guitar filling the room with a dense, eerie haze. Upon reaching the chorus, Shaw switched to distorted power chords, which fell in quick succession like drumbeats. “Shake your head/it’s empty,” Haines sang, arms akimbo while whipping her messy blond locks wildly from side to side.
Always a highlight, the miniature epic “Hustle Rose” opened with a synth arpeggiator before piling on electric piano, guitar and a fantastic double-time snare beat. Haines’ serpentine synth line guided the song organically from section to section and more and more heads could be seen bobbing with every passing verse. During the breakdown, the front half of the room went wild before the band pulled back on the reigns, keeping the song from spinning out of control. “Why is D.C. so fucking sick?” Haines asked afterward. “Why is it always so good here?” The band followed with “Handshakes,” whose shouted refrain of “Buy this car to drive to work!/Drive to work to pay for this car!” was realized as an angry commuter sing-along (and really, can you blame us for needing a little group therapy?).
Before exiting the stage, the band coaxed the audience to clap in time with some falsetto “Oohs,” which were then sampled and looped as the band left the stage. This disembodied loop played through the PA for a few minutes before Metric returned, immediately launching into “Monster Hospital”. At this point in the set, folks are usually getting ready to leave but judging by the audience’s demeanor, you would never guess it was the encore. “Monster Hospital” pushed the energy in the room to a new plateau and the Clash-referencing chorus of “I fought the war/but the war won” incited a deafening, audience-wide chant.
Metric may have gotten off to a slow start on Thursday night but by the end of their set, the band had proven that, given a little time, they can get all 1,200 of the 9:30 Club’s bodies moving. If you saw the band last year, you might remember that Haines called D.C. “a place we can rely on”. And if you saw them again this year, you’ll realize what high praise that was, coming from a band as reliable as Metric.