The Broken West / Throw Me the Statue @ RnR Hotel
The Broken West
Back in 2007, L.A.'s The Broken West seemed to make a point of stopping through D.C. on a weekly basis. In the space of a few months, they opened for The Walkmen, The Long Winters, and shared a bill with The Whigs. Each time I caught them they were pretty good -- never great -- but didn't quite live up to the tried-and-true California power pop of their proper debut, I Can't Go On, I'll Go On. Their latest, Now or Heaven, is a little more done-up, with more blips and beeps and an altogether denser atmosphere.
Live though, they're the same old power pop crew, and there's still something missing. Last night's opener, "Gwen, Now and Then", is a nice song full of resignation and a little bitterness that unsurprisingly borrows heavily from The Smiths. New tune "Auctioneer" broke the predictability with a big organ solo, and "Smartest Man Alive" threw a cutesy indie pop bass part into the mix. Yet none of them packed much of a punch, and whether you blame the foggy sound, the lack of variety in song structure, or the band themselves, it's still a problem they've had each time I've seen them.
Still, power pop groups are impressively resistant to modern musical trends, economic recession, and changes in fashion, which makes the good ones even fewer and farther between. Count The Broken West amongst these. They may have their lethargic moments, but they also have "So It Goes" -- a nod to Nick Lowe's classic in more than just name -- with its urgent quarter-note snare and wistful organ, and "Down in the Valley", a three minute distillation of CCR and The Stones often attempted but rarely done so well. And while last night's closer "Brass Ring" might mean the band's great grandkids will still be paying off their collective debt to Big Star, the band wear that debt proudly, and that's pretty much the essence of power pop right there.
Seattle youngsters Throw Me the Statue took the stage pretty soon thereafter, the crowd thinning a bit despite Rock and Roll Hotel's best attempts at drunxsploitation with their "Not Dead Yet" night upstairs. Poor guys got up on stage, started promisingly with a rollicking little guitar riff, only to find their mics weren't working. Luckily the problem was fixed in time for song two, a "new song" which found lead man Scott Reitherman swapping guitar for a floor tom and snare. What could've been a gimmick -- they were thankfully without cheerleaders, uniformed or otherwise -- was actually pretty powerful, giving the performance the kind of dynamic quality most indie pop bands sacrifice for perceived tunefulness.
They pulled the same trick a second time on a cover of Huey Lewis's "Is This It?", a song I could barely recognize (in a good way). It was this same kind of approach that propped the band up on tunes when Reitherman's fey vocals couldn't quite sustain either melody or interest. From little flourishes -- like the keyboards replicating the lyrical "scream" in "Yucatan Gold" -- to less traditional arrangements -- the xylophone on "Lolita" was literally rocking inasmuch as that's possible, it's subtleties that will end up setting these guys apart.
But like any indie pop band worth their salt, the moments of catchiness eventually shone through. "Take It or Leave It" -- off their debut, Moonbeams -- featured a punchy little harmony chorus, but, best of all, was the sadly unnamed closing song of the night. A big, rocking intro led the way into a breezy verse-chorus, before a perfectly sloppy Malkmusian breakdown built back up into a singalong worthy of early Weezer. A nice little pop whirlwind to close the night and suggest that Throw Me the Statue may have their best days still ahead of them.
Photos from the bands' websites.