Last Friday, Spoon came to Sonar and played an unexpectedly dynamic show to a rapt audience. It was the most chilled out, laid-back rock concert I have been to. No one moshed - the dancing consisted mostly of head-bobbing and rocking from side to side. One person even apologized for brushing into me in the middle of the crowd. The audience had a respectful, appreciative enthusiasm for Spoon, which the band rewarded with not one, but two encores. The opening acts also added a lot to the show and definitely did a good job of warming up the audience for Spoon.
The show opened with a performance by the White Rabbits, a young, all-male, six-person indie rock band from Brooklyn. The band describes their style as "honky-tonk calypso" and has two drummers and three singers. They maintained a great intensity throughout their set with songs from their debut album, Fort Nightly. Many of the women in the audience swooned over various members of the band - my personal favorite was the piano player (and singer), Stephen Patterson. In between songs he would gnaw on lemon slices and toss them onto the stage, lending him a certain devil-may-care persona.
The Walkmen were up next, and impressed the audience with their slightly grittier rock, a sort of post-punk revival, complemented the White Rabbits' sound extremely well. The lead singer, Hamilton Leithauser, had a distinctive persona, leaning on himself for a bit of added rock-star swagger. The crowd was receptive to the White Rabbits and the Walkmen, which were both engaging bands with indie-rock sounds similar to Spoon's, but the audience was clearly there for the main event.
Spoon's adaptability throughout the concert was striking. They employed a three-piece horn section, whose musicians were not real members of Spoon, which added another dimension to their sound on several songs. The band's sound and pace also changed significantly from song to song and from album to album. Britt Daniel, the lead singer of Spoon and a guitarist, held the audience's attention with his presence and intensity. The rest of the band, comprised of Jim Eno on drums, Rob Pope on bass and Eric Harvey on keyboard, guitar, percussion and backing vocals. Spoon played all of their hits, including "The Delicate Place," "Don't You Evah," "I Turn My Camera On," "The Way We Get By," "You Got Yr. Cherry Bomb" and "I Summon You." When the band played one of their lesser-known songs, "The Ghost of You Lingers," Britt Daniel knelt to the ground and distorted his guitar as the dramatic, colorful lighting showcased his intensity. The band's '80s-glam performance of the song enthralled the audience.
The lighting at the concert was consistently beautiful, and perfectly timed to go with the music - the colors and patterns changed with each song. Spoon seemed exceptionally receptive to the audience and fed off of their enthusiasm. Their first encore consisted of a few of their own songs, but for their second encore the band brought back their horns section and finished out the evening with a rousing rendition of the Rolling Stones' "Rocks Off," leaving the crowd on a high note.
About 10 minutes after the show ended and much of the audience had left for the night, a sweat-soaked, exhausted Britt Daniel came back around to linger with the stragglers from the audience. He happily gave autographs and took pictures with all of the fans who requested them. While I am by no means a die-hard Spoon fan, their concert definitely gave me a newfound appreciation for the band and the versatility of their music.
