“I can do a great Morrissey impression. Do you wanna hear it?”
It wasn’t what you expected from ’90s indie-rock icon Evan Dando, laying down a thoughtful solo set at the Larimer Lounge on Sunday night. But still there he was, slamming through a medley-oriented set of singles from his solo career and his time fronting The Lemonheads.
The set was refreshing and frustrating.
Dando was self-effacing in his short stories and the broad swath of material covered. But he presented the music in an often-truncated form with shortened songs mashed together like a filmy, day-old alphabet soup. And Dando’s issues with the rock club’s sound system didn’t help the general vibe. Such a simple show should have sounded better.
Still the artist and the material spoke for themselves. Dando and his careful interpretations of the playful “Being Around,” the loving “Into Your Arms” and the heartbreaking “Big Gay Heart” – all like-minded songs from the 1993 record “Come on Feel the Lemonheads” – were translated beautifully and still hold up with the rest of the songs Dando threw down. “Confetti” was excellent and lively, as was “Frank Mills,” which he prefaced by saying it was the part of the set where he’d play songs he barely remembers.
-Ricardo Baca
Grandmaster Flash
This mixmaster, responsible for pioneering a number of DJ techniques, is a legend straight from hip-hop’s ghetto block party past. But even his larger-than-life persona, characterized by a recent Vanity Fair photo shoot and a showcase spot on the “VH1 Hip Hop Honors,” were not enough to draw a crowd for last Friday’s Cervantes Masterpiece Ballroom show.
Neither the venue nor the artist promoted this appearance much. With a ticket price ($25) that exceeded most small and mid-size stages in town that night, the paltry turnout came as little surprise. Denver ingenue DJ Idiom still managed to dish up a proper opening with a lush, head-snapping mix.
Flash charged into his set but was far from spontaneous, with a member of his entourage standing stage right to hand off each new album. Some people in the audience found the DJ’s turntable trickery to be stereotypical of an old-school cat but most deemed the theatrics wise and entertaining.
Even the liveliest performer would have struggled to raise the energy level in this empty room. Flash gave it his best shot, playing up drum sequences in selections as unexpected as Genesis and AC/DC. And for that, the few in attendance were appeased.
-Elana Ashanti Jefferson
The Funeral
The blistering electro sounds booming out Lipgloss’ doors last Friday weren’t from the DJs’ CD/vinyl collections. The Funeral played a short set during the popular club night, and the band’s appearance there made sense. Lipgloss is the place to hear quality synth pop, both new and old, and The Funeral is Denver’s latest entry into the sub-genre.
The Funeral is definitely onto something. Its sound – imagine Muse meeting The Faint in a Jets-vs.-Sharks-type alley battle – is tight, jiggable and on-point. The image is there, too, as the bass-keys-and-drums trio is into it and in sync.
But that’s also part of the problem. This trio should be a quartet, at least onstage. As with so much electro out there, the band depends too heavily on tracking in its live show. As the fearless guitar leads the way through some of the tracks, not a guitar is in sight. The bass, too, was double-tracked, so when singer Adam Marez raises his hands to clap, the bass line continues regardless of the dangling, unattended bass around his neck.
-Ricardo Baca
