Los Campesinos! @ the Bowery Ballroom
May 29th, 2008 - by Linda
It gives me a warm, happy feeling inside to see headlining bands in the audience during opening acts. It shows me that they genuinely care about music and are probably nice people.
The members of Los Campesinos! not only watched both of their opening bands, but stood in the front, cheering and sometimes even singing along. In this way, Los Campesinos! forever endeared themselves to me before they even started playing.
Aleks (lead vocals/keyboard/melody horn), Ellen (bass/vocals), Gareth (lead vocals/glockenspiel/keyboard), Harriet (violin/keyboard/vocals), Neil (guitar/vocals), Ollie (drums/vocals), and Tom (guitar/vocals) Campesinos! (their adopted last name) met at Cardiff University. They have since graduated college (all but Aleks, who had to take a leave from medical school). Their debut album, Hold On Now, Youngster, was released in the U.S. on April 1 of this year. The band played at the Bowery Ballroom on Monday, May 19, for its fifth stop on its U.S. and Canada tour, continuing until the middle of June.
The first band, Flying, a trio from Brooklyn, did little for me, especially vocally. The three alternated on vocals and while a good voice is obviously not a requirement in rock ‘n’ roll, they did not make up for it with style, conviction, or stage presence, the way the other two bands did. They just sounded very shy and awkward and it was a little uncomfortable to watch. I’d like to give them the benefit of the doubt and say that they were probably nervous and maybe will get better as they become more comfortable around an audience.
The Jersey-based Titus Andronicus gets points for being named after an underrated Shakespeare play. I probably wouldn’t listen to this band at home–the music was a little too repetitive and, well, loud for my taste–but their energy was a relief after the previous set. There was a large group of friends or fans (I couldn’t tell which) in the audience who already knew the lyrics. During the band’s self-titled song, the lyrics evolved into an outcry of, “Your life is over.” There was something both disturbing and gratifying about a room full of people repeating this as lead singer Patrick Stickles jumped off an amp and mimed pointing a gun to his head. The power of rock does have a way of bringing people together.
This proved to be true during the final set by the band that made me allow the exclamation point as an acceptable form of punctuation. It was a good size crowd for a Monday night, maybe sold out, but I’m not sure. Everybody was cheerful and dancing (then again, how can you not dance to Los Campesinos!), and the crowd was one of the most polite I have ever witnessed. Everyone gave each other room and I saw no pushing or shoving. At one point, someone actually apologized for accidentally bumping into me.
Starting with the hyperactive screams of “One, two, three, four!” of “Broken Heartbeats Sound Like Breakbeats,” the band launched into a set as joyous as the album. One of the best things about seeing a band with only one album is that they are pretty much gauranteed to play the song that you’ve been listening to on repeat all week (for me, that song was “We Are All Accelerated Readers”).
We are All Accelerated Readers
I barely noticed the issues with Gareth’s mic, or mics (at one point he was using two). The band members are all between the ages of 21 and 23 and their songs have a juvenile ADHD-like quality, yet there is a sophistication in the clever lyrics and arrangements. The band was as interesting to watch as to listen to, especially Gareth, who looked like a little boy (no disrespect intended) with his horse shirt and charade-like hand motions. In any case, they were having fun with each other (I’m pretty sure Gareth licked Neil at one point) and the audience.
They closed appropriately with “Sweet Dreams Sweet Cheeks” (not to sound old, but at close to midnight, it was past my bedtime) before coming back for an encore, “2007, The Year Punk Rock Broke (My Heart).” In 2008, though, punk rock shouldn’t break the hearts of anyone listening to Los Campesinos!
