"WOW!"
"So beautiful."
"Awesoooome."
"Oh my gosh, he has an ACCENT?!"
That was the extent of my vocabulary last night as I hit up the John Waldron Arts Center to check out one of this season's hottest Bloomington shows featuring Ra Ra Riot with Cut Off Your Hands and So Many Dynamos. My usual verbosity was swept away by the lush sounds that filled the venue that night, leaving me more speechless than usual (and that's saying a lot).
Excited for the headliners, as I've been spinning Ra Ra's latest album, The Rhumb Line, for a solid week now, and curious to see the opening acts, I could not have anticipated a better show. As far as 2009 goes, this show is shaping up to make it on my five best of the year...and it's only March.
I arrived on the scene around 9:00, and the Waldron was already packed, a line even winding its way out the door. There was a certain buzz in the air, and I should have guessed then that the night would be an exciting one.
Soon enough, So Many Dynamos took the stage, and from the first strum of the guitar the crowd was engaged. After beckoning to those perched in the bleacher-seats in the back, people filed down to the stage to get a closer look and listen of the St. Louis quartet. With a sound that has been (accurately) compared to the likes of a fresher, slightly more angular Q and Not U, the band ripped through a set of seven songs, including a song off of their album Flashlights, "Search Party," that led the singer to play the synth with drumsticks and his chin. HIS CHIN!
Their music was a mix of manic guitars and sharp stabs of synth, often shifting back and forth between time signatures, their drummer leading the way with his defined, perfected style.
(SIDENOTE: I later met three of the band members [Aaron, Clayton and Griffin, to be exact] outside right before Ra Ra's set. After discovering that it was their first night on the tour AND that they are friendly with Pattern is Movement, a band that dominated WIUX's Culture Shock last year, they invited me to Rockett's for pizza. I had to politely decline--journalist's duty to stay on the scene, you know.)
Soon after Cut Off Your Hands took the stage. After drooling and reveling in their accents (they're from Auckland, New Zealand, don't you know), I was immediately impressed with their precision and pop sensibility, or as my friend Tim calls it, "stiletto punk rock." Although the slight jangle pop/dance rock sound of their new album, You & I, didn't translate live how I would have imagined it to, they still burned brighter than ever. I couldn't help but bob my head and move my feet during their driving dance numbers, the best of which was "Too Cold," found on the new album.
After a quick and rousing set, Ra Ra Riot graced the stage, the six-piece band comfortably filling the tiny space. Surprisingly enough to me, the rich sounds found on their album The Rhumb Line sounded like utter perfection in the dark auditorium. Singer Wesley Miles floated around the stage in a Morrissey-esque manner as the female string section (cellist Alexandra Lawn and violinist Rebecca Zeller) filled the room with an ethereal vibrancy. They glided through a lengthier set, playing songs like Kate Bush cover "Suspended in Gaffa," "Oh, La," "Ghost Under Rocks," and the show closer, "Dying is Fine." After rounds of applause, the band re-emerged for an encore, playing a new number that was slightly darker and more intense then their Rhumb Line material.
All in all, the show was (not to be hyperbolic) phenomenal. The bands were on-point, the sound was beautiful and the crowd was eating it up. So, my advice: Don't miss these bands next time they come to town. You'll regret it.
By Kelsey McArdle
