There were only 13 people at the start of the show, but that didn’t stop Wives frontman Dean Spunt from doing what comes naturally at the Hi-Dive on Tuesday. The self-proclaimed informal mayor of Los Angeles and Seth Green stunt double got down to his skinny skivvies just a few noisy songs into a liberating salvo of bombastic, hilarious chain-saw rock. With an intentional static through-line playing throughout, the near-naked Spunt even took a detour into the men’s room while guitarist Randy Randall crowd-surfed, sans crowd. (And I would swear he was sort-of sampling Stevie Nick’s “Edge of Seventeen.”) The all-too-brief breakneck set, opening the Magicyclops CD re-
release party and Devo afterparty, climaxed with Randall lodging two guitars in the Hi-Dive’s ceiling light tree as Spunt conducted a performance-art re-dressing. The set blissfully fulfilled the punkers’ mantra, “I’m much too young to be unimportant.”
-John Moore
White Stripes
Tiny, adorable Meg White performed “Passive Manipulation” twice on Monday at the White Stripes’ first trip to Red Rocks. The 35-second song from the Stripes’ new record “Get Behind Me Satan” has Meg on the timpani and her ex-husband and bandmate Jack White on the piano. Later, Jack took back the reins – and took on the marimbas – on “The Nurse,” and late in the encore Jack led the minimalist Detroit rock duo in a rousing take on the countrified spiritual rager “Little Ghost,” both of which are from the new record.
All this from a band that broke on modern rock radio.
The beauty of the Stripes is that they make teenagers go crazy over music – the blues, garage rock, alt-country and Caribbean- tinged pop – you won’t otherwise find on mainstream radio. And that’s a public service.
-Ricardo Baca
The English Beat/Devo
Proving 30- and 40-somethings can still rock, sort-of, the Lost 80s Live concert bellied up to Coors Amphitheatre on Tuesday.
The English Beat set the tone for an awkward yet endearing appearance by doing a sound check and warm-up onstage in front of the audience while speakers continued to pipe background music. The move confused onlookers and the production staff. Singer- guitarist Dave Wakeling used the last-minute sound check to launch into cornball jokes he called up repeatedly during a greatest-hits tour that included “I Confess,” “Best Friend,” “Tenderness,” “Save It for Later” and “Mirror in the Bathroom.” The band lacked the charisma of its ska revival days, when punk toaster Ranking Roger and sax player Saxa rounded out the act.
Everything seemed like a warm-up once Devo showed up in their belted yellow monkey suits and red tiered energy domes. After sounding an alarm akin to a nuclear reactor mishap, the guys marched in place to “That’s Good,” a song that reminded people these former art school students dished up some of new wave’s fiercest percussions. The band indulged the audience with more old-school camp but what really worked about songs like “Satisfaction” and “Girl U Want” was their strong disco-punk musicianship.
-Elana Ashanti Jefferson
