Band of the Week + concert review: io echo

I'm a bit of an arrogant prick when it comes to music.
I'm a purist, through and through. Although I am open to hear anything, very, very few things impress me. I enjoy a wide variety of music but I am rarely dumbfounded by a band's presence. In other words, few things stay with me past the initial experience hearing a record or seeing the band. The feeling is in the moment, it's fleeting and it's incomplete. A handful of artists (The Strokes, The Clash, The Beatles, Delta Spirit, Ryan Adams, Spoon, Arctic Monkeys, Wild Sweet Orange…you know, the artists I post about over and over and over again) never fail to deliver, and they have my loyalty. Other than that, I’ll go years without listening to most bands, because they can’t capture my attention and my interest past perhaps news of a new record or whatnot.

Now, my regular readers should be accustomed by now to my habit of combining my Friday weekly post of “Band of the Week” with either a record review of an album I’m digging at the moment, or with a concert review of a band I had seen recently and really enjoyed. Two birds with one stone (or, as the high school vegan in me would say, “two soy beans with one caring hand”): I could simultaneously expose my readers to a band that I think they should hear about and feel satisfied with my concert going experience, having dissected it for the review.

My super meticulous readers will also know that I have never posted an opening band as band of the week WHEN COMBINED WITH A CONCERT REVIEW. As in, if I have the title “Band of the Week + concert review”, the “band” in question would ALWAYS be the main act. (this does not, of course, disallow me from posting about opening bands that I dig as “band of the week”, just not combined with a concert review.)

But I am elaborating far too much. This is what happens when I go two days without writing academically. I flood my blog with in depth details. Sorry guys, I know I’m a shameless English major, but I’ll get to the point now.

Wednesday night, I saw OK Go at Great American Music Hall. I didn’t know which bands were opening, I actually missed the first couple of songs of the first opening band, having lost track of time at Amoeba.


As I found my place in the audience, I thought the band on stage was decent. The song shortly ended as I found a spot on the dance floor, and the lead singer, ever so shy, hesitantly introduced the band. “We’re io echo,” she said, “and you can find t shirts and cds and stuff in the back”. I thought she was going to faint with fright, or, rather, was suppressing an urge to run away and lock herself into a closet, which isn’t something I found appealing in a band. I thrive on good ol’ fashioned bravado: shameless confidence on stage. Maybe that’s why I love Pelle Almqvist so fucking much.


As I began to lose interest, however, their guitarist caught me off guard with riff that I know so well, it’s well under my skin, more an intrinsic part of me, really. As I looked back on stage, the front woman said, a bit more boldly, “and here’s a Beatles cover we like to do.”


io echo then proceeded to blow me away with one of the best Beatles covers that I have ever heard. They tackled my favourite song off Abbey Road: the perfect antecedent to the happy-go-lucky “Here Comes The Sun”, the ever brooding, ominous, epically awesome “I Want You (She’s So Heavy)”.

Nobody has the balls to cover The Beatles anymore. Or, rather, unsigned artists who are the first of three bands playing relatively small venues usually don’t muster up the courage to tread into such sacred territory, in fear of backlash from the audience. I was impressed not only by the gesture itself, but its execution. In short, they nailed it. And then they proceeded to play an incredibly infectious tune, and then closed their set with a slightly less impressive song. But it didn’t matter. I was sold.


Now, for part two of my “I am an arrogant music purist” schpeel:

I turn my nose up at most people's tastes and attitudes. This, of course, is because most people have awful taste in music. I blame pop culture for this. Most of what is popular today is pure and utter shite.

Enter opening band #2. Calling themselves Jaguar Love, two assholes took the stage and proceeded to torture me with 45 horrid minutes of agony. I will not call it music. The poor guitarist was actually decent, but his occasional spurts of borderline-enjoyable guitar bits were drowned out and overpowered by the lead singer, who was the exact antithesis of io’s lead singer. Loud, abrasive and annoying, this guy was trying to be Ozzy, Gerard Way, Bowie, and Andrew VanWyngarden, all at the same time. Identity crises aside, he couldn’t sing to save his g-d forsaken life. The noise on stage was an utter mess, like the idea of MGMT, only gone terribly, terribly wrong. On crack, if you will. There was way too much happening at once, nothing aurally pleasant in sight.


Back to my point, people have shite taste in music. Following io’s spectacular (albeit short) set, the girl standing next to me said “I didn’t really like that, the lead singer was weird” and later proceeded to make an equally stupid comment regarding Jaguar Love. While her friend was nodding enthusiastically after the duo left the floor (because, failing to capture the audience’s attention with their music, the guys had resorted to jumping on the dance floor and finally got people enthused before they ended their set), the girl gushed “awesome! And that guy has a good voice, too.”


I could have slapped her, or thrown up. I managed to avoid either, but I was very well on the verge of the first urge.

Anyhow, moving on to the main attraction (ostensibly, as they were headlining), OK Go were good. In earnest, I enjoyed their set. Damien Kulash has a great voice.


Both he and his bandmates Tim (bass),



Dan (drums)


and Andy (lead guitar)



are - surprise, surprise, quite musically talented. You wouldn’t expect that from OK Go, they seem more like a joke band (Flight of the Conchords) than one you would take seriously. All of that aside, they have a solid set of songs, and based on what I heard at the concert, the new record is shaping up quite nicely, although a tad too slow for my taste. They bust out the acoustic guitars a bit too often, and OK Go is best enjoyed like your favourite sugar rush: fast, short and super sweet.

They captivated the crowd with streamers and confetti, with plastic tambourines thrown to the audience, and, most provocatively, with Damien spending a good five minutes telling us about the state of his testicles.


Set List:

and here's the one I snagged, it was Damien's and Dan signed it:


The best part of my night was the 15 or so minutes that I got to hear of io echo. I caught up with the band after the show, and they told me that after the tour, they’re heading back to LA to finalize their record. They have a wee EP out now, containing three original songs and, (this made me giddy), including the fabulous Fab four cover.

Now, listen to “Addicted”, a song that takes the best bits of Rocky Horror Picture Show and adds a funky twist to it to make it listenable on the 364 days that are not October 31st.

io echo – Addicted [mp3]

according to the band’s myspace, “IO IS FROM THE EAST COAST. SHE WRITES SONGS IN A LATE HOUR LOCKED IN A BEDROOM SITUATION. SHE PLAYS THE GUITAR AND KEYBOARDS. IO'S SONGS ARE PRODUCED BY LEOPOLD ROSS (KORN, ERROR). HE IS PALE AND BRITISH. HE ALSO PLAYS GUITAR IN THE BAND. THEY ARE YOUNG, HYPER, AND HAVE BRUISED KNEES AT ALL TIMES.”

I’m guessing, based on their poster, and the above description, that the “band” is really just io and Leopold, with accompanying band mates for live shows.

And those talented mo-fos are the following:

Michael Edelstein: guitar
Aram Kirakosian: bass
Paul Rinis: drums
Salvatore Romano: tambourine, keys

visit them on MYSPACE

here are the remaining tour dates:
Mar 27 Wonder Ballroom w/ OK GO Portland, Oregon
Mar 28 hop Suey w/ OK GO Seattle, Washington
Apr 4 4th and B w/ AUTOLUX San Diego, California

Stay tuned for Sunday Morning Covers this week, you guys will be getting an mp3 of the song that transformed not only my perception of the band, but of my blogging habits as well. “Band of the Week + Concert Review” has blossomed and is no longer limited to headliners. Kudos to io echo, and, of course, all my gratitude to the best four-piece import America ever received from Liverpool.

conclusion:

io echo - 4/5

jaguar love - 0.4/5

ok go - 3.5/5