So the show at the Talking Head on Tuesday was pretty good, better than I expected, in fact. I chatted with Tom Breihan between bands and he was in agreeance with me on that (see, he said so on his blog). Both Travis Morrison and Beauty Pill played better than when I saw them each earlier this year. And the one band I hadn't heard of on the bill, Karmella's Game, turned out to be really enjoyable. When they first appeared onstage, all wearing matching red sweaters with shirts and ties underneath, I was prepared for the worst. Bands in uniform scare me sometimes, I think. And the two girls in the band look like they're about 15. And they play the kind of indie pop with purposefully '80's-sounding keyboards that I usually shy away from. But they were really really good, lots of energy, big big hooks, and the tiny keyboardist/singer girl had the dorky charm of, say, Ashlee Simpson with more cred. I'm definitely hoping they pop up on more local bills I want to see in the future.

Aside from having a new singer/keyboardist, Beauty Pill played pretty much the same set I saw them do 6 months ago (at least from what I could tell, I walked in after they'd already started). But they've definitely improved as a live band, they never really rock hard but they get amped up sufficiently when the occasion calls for it. Songs that, for me, fall kinda flat on record, like "The Western Prayer" and "Goodnight For Real", turn out to be highlights live. And I was happy that they played "You, Yes You" without incident this time, because that's one of my favorites, and back in April opening for Q And Not U at the Ottobar, the first few lines of the song ("you remind me of the Jackson 5/back when Michael Jackson was still alive/skyscraping afro in the bloom of youth" etc.) prompted some obnoxious audience member to shout "Michael Jackson! Michael Jackson!" over and over throughout the song, which wouldn't have been so annoying if it wasn't a fairly quiet song. I mean, I know it's kind of a laugh line, but there's no need to make a big deal about it.

Travis's last show at the TH was one of his first with his new backing band, so they were still a bit shaky then, but a couple months of touring has tightened them up considerably, and I'm impressed that they're still making changes to the song arrangements. I mean, the Dismemberment Plan were one of my favorite live bands of all time, and I saw them at least a dozen times and never got tired of it, but they pretty much always played songs the same way as they are on the records. And while it doesn't flatter what he's doing now to compare it too closely to the old band, it is refreshing that Travis is tinkering with the new stuff a lot more when playing live. Since I only just finally bought Travistan this week and have only listened to it once so far, after the show, my basis of comparison was more to how the songs sounded at the previous show, and when the Plan started playing those songs a couple years ago. I still really wish I could hear the demos the Plan made of those songs. I remember they actually put up a studio quality mp3 of "Angry Angel" on their site for a few days at one point, and I'm still kicking myself for just listening to it a couple times and not saving the file. At that point I figured it was just gonna be on their next record, when there was still gonna be a next one. I'm a little surprised that there's no acknowledgement in the liner notes of the jacking of Fugazi's "Break" in "Born In '72", I vaguely remember seeing Ian Mackaye at one of the Black Cat shows where they played that song and wishing I could've seen his reaction during that part (years ago Travis used to write a column on this site called Held Like Sound which no longer exists, and he wrote a really good piece about End Hits when it first came out). Travis didn't do any covers this time, so his set was limited to songs from the album and was relatively short, but still satisfying. I wish they'd play "Sixteen Types of People", though. I think I like it better than any of the songs that are actually on the album (and you can download it from his site).

Labels: Baltimore music, concerts, Travis Morrison

This entry was posted on Saturday, November 13, 2004 at 10:23 AM. You can skip to the end and leave a response.