Jen had an extra ticket for a show, and if I’m free then I’m in for whatever it is, and so I was, and so I did. And she’s always a good hang, not even needing a show but just getting together for an evening. I probably only knew Strfckr for maybe opening shows around town because they were local or getting low billing at a festival, but they have a great name (though they'll do a Cyndi Lauper cover rather than a Rolling Stones or Nine Inch Nails song) (and a clever way around their name to dare marquee value when they started to get big, which must have been a surprise since no band would start off with such a risqué name if they expected to go anywhere. (Even with the all-caps, which anyone knows I hate (as much as no-caps))). We got there early so we had time to kill (not bothering to see Reptilians, who were on but we stayed in the right-side bar, saving our energy), and Jen doesn’t drink, and matching her to be polite was actually a welcome respite from getting blurry at a show and risking not remembering most of it. And she’s good for conversation, usually about gaming and/or other music, not gossip or the SuperBowl which was earlier that day (marking the crowd as not one for sports). It was a younger audience but not kids (relatively), possibly following their home-town heroes even if that’s as far as the band could get. They're male indie dance-pop, in a sea of male indie dance-pop (just in L.A.), with low vocals that too easily got swallowed in the place (a venue maybe better for bigger bands who have more control over their sound), an aim for as much pop as they could do with as short as their songs must have been to pack in so many (even if they ran together in the mix), and not too much to distinguish them except for a lot of energy and a singer whose style harked back to the loopy pastels of Chip Z’Nuff from back in the days of MTV hair-metal (and also a local stalwart). The show didn’t hit me so much, but it was good to get out and have a mellow evening, even at a show, with a friend whose taste in music can be trusted to want to check out new bands (and maybe find something in them later).
Strfckr’s set-list:
“Hungry Ghost“
“Tape Machine“
“Satellite“
"Kahlil Gibran“
“Mystery Cloud“
“Atlantis“
“Isabella of Castile“
“Lucky“
“Rawnald Gregory Erickson the Second“
Mystery Cloud Interlude
“Sazed“
“Sensitive“
“Lazer Fight“
“Gyrating Hips“
“Hamsters“
“German Love“
“Interspace“
“Golden Light“
“Helium Muffin“
“Bury Us Alive“
“Medicine“
“Millions“
“Girls Just Want to Have Fun“ (Cyndi Lauper cover)
“Open Your Eyes“
“Never Ever“
“Filler“
“While I'm Alive“
“Being No One, Going Nowhere“
“Leave It All Behind“
“Maps”
