The New Pornographers, October 17, 2014 at the Wiltern

The New Pornographers were a good enough idea at the beginning -- basically an indie super-group -- then it was astounding when Neko Case went from a studio buddy to actually touring with them, and she actually kept sticking around. She probably could have sold venues just as well as the whole band but whatever kept her traveling with them, not just continuing to make music, was welcome, as was their coming to town. We might have seen them enough for a while, and Brill Bruisers wasn’t an album that needed a particular amount of support (though it raised up Together by comparison) but when everyone else said they were in for it we threw in as well. Even better to come out when they’d graduated to the Wiltern (but two nights at the Fonda was pretty good too).  As it was it was a standard show, a run-through of their stuff, a few decent deeper cuts, and a comfortable crowd of great musicians on stage, most of which could do -- and actually do -- their own solo stuff (not just Neko). Not as extraordinary as when they’ve had stronger material to draw from (not that their latest was lesser material, but their first three albums set an incredibly high standard) but still a treat to see them all.  Even if they kept putting out merely good albums, as long as they have those elements in the mix, they’ll be worth supporting. Another draw for us was seeing openers Pains of Being Pure at Heart, a band good enough that it almost could have been a co-headlining tour that New Porn just happened to close every night, but, being a Friday night to have dinner with Tana & Jamin and Jake & Lauralee, we missed them -- a disappointment but their latest album Days of Abandon didn’t seem like it was going to supplant memories of seeing them for their earlier stuff.


The New Pornographers' set-list:
"Brill Bruisers"
"Myriad Harbour"
"Use It"
"War On the East Coast"
"Moves"
"All the Old Showstoppers"
"Champions of Red Wine"
"Jackie, Dressed in Cobras"
"Another Drug Deal of the Heart"
"The Laws Have Changed"
"You Tell Me Where"
"Testament to Youth in Verse"
"Wide Eyes"
"Crash Years"
"Adventures in Solitude"
"Spidyr"
"Sweet Talk, Sweet Talk"
"Backstairs"
"Silver Jenny Dollar"
"Fantasy Fools"
"Born With a Sound"
"Mass Romantic"

"Dancehall Domine"
"Sing Me Spanish Techno"
"The Bleeding Heart Show"

"Execution Day"
"The Slow Descent Into Alcoholism"

the Hives, September 14 at the Wiltern

As soon as I got the e-mail about the tickets, I wondered why I was initially going to skip seeing the Hives.  It was probably just being conservative: after having seen them at Coachella, there wasn't reason to make a great effort and spend the money to see them again.  They were my favorite act at the festival, as they usually are, but I didn't feel I needed more than that for this cycle.  But if tickets are free, anyone would be a fool not to go.  Rachel had tickets through her job, as she often did, and this was the first time she made the offer for a show and I could take her up on it (and thanks again, Rachel!).  Unfortunately, by the time I could get back to her to say that I definitely wanted to go, there was only one more extra ticket, so it was the very rare show that I went to without Carla, though she gave me her blessing to go.  I met up with Andrew and Heather, who had been drinking for most of the evening, for drinks and meet up with some of their friends, before Rachel met up with us and we went in to the show, scheduled to start close to midnight, which is so late it's almost not rock n' roll, but it gave us more time to drink.  The place was full but it was easy to get that maybe the crowd was stocked by people who just got tickets rather than real fans clamoring to see them.  Surely in our group I was the biggest fan, and even though I was the only one who could possibly have been prepared for the assault that is the Hives in concert, everyone else was able to get into it and maybe appreciate the majesty and sonic brutality that is a Hives show.  They never disappoint and they never give less than 100%.  As it might be a practiced show and even Pele's stage banter might be memorized, they never do less than entertain.  The only criticism could be that the crowd doesn't recognize their music enough to really get into it but that's their own fault for not paying attention to them after they stopped getting so much buzz a few years ago.  Whether the music is familiar or not, it's a show that seeks to entertain, and if you're not going to be open to that then you'll be run over.   The Hives don't care.  They're there to wreck any venue that will have them and the place is only lucky to be left standing when they're done.  If they don't get to take over the world as was their original mission statement, then they might as well obliterate it.  We were left obliterated that night.  Fidlar opened, and I listened to them a while later but at that time I didn't know a thing about them, which is a shame that I missed them, but we also had drinks to drink.

The Hives' set-list:
"Come On!"
"Try It Again"
"Take Back the Toys"
"1000 Answers"
"Walk Idiot Walk"
"Main Offender"
"My Time Is Coming"
"Die, All Right!"
"Wait a Minute"
"No Pun Intended"
"These Spectacles Reveal the Nostalgics"
"I Want More"
"Won't Be Long"
"Hate to Say I Told You So"
"Patrolling Days"
"Go Right Ahead"
"Insane"
"Tick Tick Boom"