It’s hot down here. Really hot. I tried to
wear a jumper because I thought it would make me look young but now I’m
sweating so furiously that it could just as easily be my tears. Elvis Presley
would feel self-conscious down here tonight though, as three lads who’ve
probably spent the afternoon play-fighting in the Urban Outfitters fitting
rooms otherwise referring to themselves as SKATERS, trudge onto a cramped stage
in The Shipping Forecast’s ‘Hold’.
Hailing from New York (of course), this trio
has tentatively ebbed their way onto the blogosphere with a handful of punchy
singles. A Barney Sumner guitar rift confidently introduces the excellent I
Wanna Dance [But I Don’t Know How], which proves to be less ironic than
you’d imagine until they eventually manage a synchronized head bob between
them. It’s a song that revels in its simplicity, stripping away any
complexities and aiming straight for those primal instincts you spend your
whole life trying to fight off. It isn’t a regression though; these songs are
just finding beauty in different places, like the explosive change in energy
between it’s verse and chorus, or the hypnotizing, rumbling drone of b-side
single Armed. There certainly isn’t anything original about the
conventional hooks and recognisable melodies on show tonight. But down here in
The Hold they are dispensed with Rubin’s self-reliant indifference and
conversational delivery, making them instantly approachable and capable of
turning a cynical introvert like me into a skanking, twerking fanboy. The
Brazen, angsty Schemers is their most complete song to date, and tonight
it fills the room nicely as Noah Rubin yells ‘I’ve got to let you know’ with
Strummer-like force that threatens to resemble defiance. There is a palpable
energy among this snugly filled venue, and the affable personality of their
stage manor and music they are playing runs a thread through every song, creating
a performance that runs with a structure and coherency far beyond their years. And
despite that inexperience, this doesn’t feel like we are stepping in on a band
practice in their garage (regardless of the venue looks like). They have honed
in on how they want to present themselves and how they want to present these
songs. And even more impressively, they sound tight as fuck.
This performance certainly seems to serve
some sort of cathartic purpose for these guys, as their lack of self-awareness
proves to be surprisingly believable. Whether Skaters are capable of translating
these buzz-friendly singles into an album that’s well stocked with instantly
gratifying pop songs is a more complicated question. Tonight though, it probably
feels like it did when The Strokes performed at Spiral in 2001, as this trio of
cooler-than-cool New Yorkers play with the knowledge that their music holds no inherent
meaning, which is exactly why it means so much.
Mike Townsend
No comments:
Post a Comment