For the second time this year, Tracers and i ventured out to see LA pop band Milo Greene. The last time we saw them was at The Drunken Unicorn, at a strange show filled with a mix of the indie punk scenesters who frequent The Unicorn and gray-haired folks who heard the band on NPR. Oh, and let's not forget The Ukulele Fairy, who opened the show...
So, that was a weird one, and then just two weeks before this show we wandered into The EARL on a Thursday to see post-rock, and ended up watching Anthony Bourdain's crew film the place. So what strangeness would await us in East Atlanta tonight?
The answer, surprisingly, is nothing weird, which in itself is unusual... Hmm.
We got there just before 9, just shortly before the first act took the stage. Lucius are a new band from Brooklyn. They had sent us a promo, and i liked the indie pop with girl-group harmonies of the band, so i was curious to see them live. Well, it came across even better in concert.
They are a five-piece band consisting of three males and two females, in uniforms. No, really. The guys all had on khaki pants and blue shirts, as well as trendy old timey mustaches.
The two girls were dressed in some kind of matching sparkly dresses of indeterminate color, with complementary hair bows positioned so that the bow was toward the crowd as they played keyboards facing each other. It's been a little while since i saw any band where clothing was obviously an important thing to them, but whatever.
They sounded really good. The drummer stood and pounded a minimal kit, and the lead guitarist at the back of the stage was really talented, making an appropriately jangly sound which was perfectly accompanied by the echoing hollowbody of the rhythm guitarist. The two females sang, played keyboards, and added some percussive effects. The shorter brunette singer had a powerful, rich voice, and she knew how to project.
The taller blonde singer had a pretty voice, but more delicate and not as loud. Then again, her back was to me, so maybe she just seemed quieter from where i was standing.
I really enjoyed the half hour that they played. They worked through all four of the songs on their debut EP, I thought that Genevieve came across well in the live setting, while Turn It Around really allowed the brunette singer to wail. In general, this was a catchy set with plenty of harmonies. Good stuff.
It took less than half an hour for Milo Greene to take the stage, which was nice as it was a work night.
They played well tonight, tearing through their debut LP to great effect. What's The Matter, perhaps my favorite on the LP, was great, with all of the voices blending smoothly. The sound mix was really good -- it had to be for all of those harmonies (in both bands) to come across right.
They also did a Stufjan Stevens cover, and it was pleasant even though i am not familiar with that artist (mostly because his first names confounds me -- how the hell do you pronounce that?), but it was pretty good.
And the band was done by midnight. All in all, a good non-weird night in East Atlanta.
Some more photos of the band:
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