Bishop Allen, Mates of State, Awesome

I love it when you walk into a venue and the band is either at the bar, or one of them is manning the merch stand. It's so endearing, and makes you feel so much more at home. Going to huge shows has its kicks too, but for me, give me some bar in NYC over Keyspan Park or Continental anyday.

October 20th found Ross and I heading back into the city to see Bishop Allen and Mates of State at the Bowery Ballroom. I have listened to Mates of State before, and I know they're good, but personally, I had gone for the opener, Bishop Allen. Before we were even able to check our will-call tickets, I saw all of the members of Bishop Allen sitting at the bar, not ten feet from the door. So, I walked over and they greeted me. Christian Rudder is possibly one of the coolest people that I have ever met, and we had a little chat. His lady, Reshma, joined us soon, and she's just adorable.

So, after chatting for a while, and bending a few ears about the gang possibly coming to play at good old Rutgers University, Ross and I went upstairs. On the way we stopped at the merch stand, and I was disappointed/expecting it when I saw no Bishop Allen merch. However, we asked the man at the table if there would be any BA gear, and to my surprise, he replied that yes, Bishop Allen had indeed brought swag, and not just their excellent CD Charm School, but also shirts. He, however, had no authority to sell them, and I would have to wait to throw money at Bishop Allen.

Ross and I were able to get surpisingly good spots upstairs, seeing as we spent more time downstairs than most. Bishop Allen came on, and I was excited to say the least. They played all the oldies and goodies first, although they missed a few. They only hit "Little Black Ache", "Empire City", and "Bishop Allen Drive", and some reasonably new songs such as "Toast from Benefit Street" and the like. But they did perform "Eve of Destruction", which I have never heard them play live at any of the other five or so shows I have seen them play, so that was a treat. A good part of the set was new material, which was fun to hear, but left me longing for the days in which I knew every word that was going to come out of Justin Rice's mouth. They were all really quality songs, though, most of which were performed with Justin on his Gibson acoustic. They were typical Bishop Allen songs, nice catchy folky pop tunes with a really depressing story. For instance, one of the songs started "I've been to Memphis, that's where my family goes to die". They were very fun to watch though, with Justin doing his patented sideways high step foot tap (if you don't know what I'm talking about, I implore you, go see them. I guarantee he'll do it for you.), and Christian Rudder doing amazing things on guitar. Christian Owens (yes, there are two Christians, one is a man, the other a woman) was holding up the rhythm on bass. Seeing "Empire City" played live is still one of my favorite things to do. The "Wey-oh"s at the end of that song are just too good to want to be doing anything else than staring slack-jawed at the whole band, performing one of their best songs, and one of the best I've ever heard from anyone. C.O. also had a bass solo in one of the new songs, which was pretty awesome. It's always good to see that the band still has a sense of humor, too. The bass drum, which had said "Delamitraux on the drums" at previous shows now sported one less 'd' and 's', now exclaiming "Delamitraux on the rum". I had a good laugh when I first saw it.

They next band to come up on the stage, Dirty on Purpose, was pretty good. They were fairly keen on making lots of noises, and going into the whole spacey etherial feel, but often interupting their mood music with a little bit of the rock. Personally, I'm not one for the spacey stuff, but let me tell you, they could indeed rock. Their guitarist is forging the way for the reemergence of feedback into indie rock. He didn't just make noise with the feedback, he nursed all the right ones out of his guitar, while kneeling in front of his amplifier. I haven't seen such adeptness with feedback... ever. The mustachioed frontman, also on a guitar, sang either in falsetto, or had left puberty behind. It was a bit of an odd fit, but it seems they had lost their keyboardist and vocalist, who was a woman, and he had to take her place. I wish they would have just changed their sound a bit rather than force this poor man to stretch his vocals to unneeded ends. The drummer also picked up on some of the vocal duties, when he wasn't busy playing the same rhythm for practically every song. And he made it obvious too, by raising his arm completely before hitting the snare in at least three different songs. Oh well. The bassist was fairly quiet all set, until they reached their penultimate song on the set list. He used such an effect on his bass the likes of which I have never heard. It was incredible.

After DOP, Mates of State graced the stage. With just an electric organ, an electric keyboard, and a drum set, and a pair of newlyweds. Kori and Jason came up to their respective instruments, and began their mushy pop songs. The best part about their set was that they nearly completely ignored the audience; they either stared at their instruments, each other, or they closed their eyes. The audience was addressed all of three times, one of which to make everyone aware that Kori's father was on the balcony. Mates of State was one of the most adorable things that I have ever seen in my life. It even seemed that when Kori moved from the electric organ away to the keyboard that the increased distance between her and her bo made the songs have a sad feel.

After the show was over, I headed back downstairs to check out the BA merch, and there stood Christian Owens behind the table. I came up and was astonished that they had shirts. You know, things you put over your torso so people can't see your skin. She had apparently broke into Pratt and silk screened them herself. She also had one shirt she hand made, which I also purchased.

And thus our night of glorious, glorious music had come to an end. We almost died on the way back.

Bishop Allen
Mates of State
Dirty on Purpose