Midlake @ the Black Cat

While Landes has yet to cultivate a fanbase outside of the northeast University circuit, she can claim to be a minor YouTube star thanks to a bluegrass cover of the Peter, Bjorn and John hit “Young Folks”. “This is kind of a gimmick,” Landes said, before introducing the song on Thursday night. Despite the knowing wink with which the song was delivered (aside from guitar, most of the accompaniment was provided by a kazoo and a miniature tambourine), Landes’ cover turned out to be an inventive, sincere reading of an undeniably catchy tune. It was enough to make us remember how much we loved “Young Folks” the first time we heard it—back before PB&J became the most overexposed indie pop band of the year. All gimmicks aside, Dawn Landes is a songwriter with potential to spare—you would be well advised to keep a close eye on her.

By the time Midlake took the stage—after carting out enough vintage synthesizers and effects pedals to make Johnny Greenwood blush—the crowd had grown to nearly fill the front half of the room. Opening with the title track “Van Occupanther,” the band set the night on its steady, mid-tempo course. “I must be careful now/in my steps,” Smith sang over a plodding piano line while guitarist Eric Nichelson chimed in with a pitch-perfect backup harmony. While the languid song struck us as an odd opener, it found the band in a laid-back groove, with every note falling perfectly into place. “Bandits” progressed at a similarly deliberate pace, but made more of an impression thanks to a stronger piano melody and the Lennon-like cadence with which Smith asked the rhetorical question, “Did you ever want to be overrun by bandits/to hand over all of your things and start everything new?”

With Van Occupanther opener “Roscoe,” the band finally found a bit of momentum, the jangling guitars falling into step behind a piano melody bearing a bit of similarity to the theme song from “M*A*S*H”. "Whenever I was a child, I wondered/ What if my name had changed into something more productive like Roscoe/ Been born in 1891, waiting with my Aunt Rosaline," Smith sang, the grammatically-perfect sentences tumbling out of his mouth just in time for his voice to take flight on the soaring chorus. While undoubtedly a highlight, the band would not match the energy that it found on “Roscoe” until far later in the set.

By way of example, the band’s rendition of the Chemical Brothers song “The Pills Won’t Help You Now” (which features Smith on vocals) was certainly resourceful, with finger-picked guitar, flute and 70s prog synths standing in for bits and bytes, but ultimately failed to take hold due to the protracted, almost monotonous pace at which it unfolded. Occasionally the band would issue a wake-up call (the bouncy toms of “Young Bride” stand out for providing a welcome boost of energy mid-set) but for the most part, chose to stack mid-tempo numbers end-to-end. “Excited But Not Enough,” from the band’s first EP, managed to stick out late in the set; consisting of layers of organ built on top of a looped beat, the verses gradually surged toward the release of the chorus—if we didn’t know any better, we might have mistaken the song for an Ok Computer B-side.

There’s no question as to whether or not Midlake has the chops to pull off their intricate compositions in a live setting—during their Thursday night set, the band consistently managed to recreate their songs in painstaking detail. Unfortunately, accuracy alone wasn’t enough to hold the audience’s attention through the hour-long set. Had Midlake chosen to vary their setlist with a few more upbeat numbers and a handful of stylistically divergent tunes from earlier releases, they might have fared better. As it stands, however, the band could bear to learn a thing or two about keeping an audience engaged. Eight years into their career, Midlake is obviously itching to find a larger audience for their music—unfortunately, they’re going to have to figure out how to conquer a small audience first.