Review by Stevelknievel; Photos by Kyle Dreher
There was love, laughter, perhaps a few tears, and in the end Metric ruled First Avenue last night.
The band’s talent may come from both Canada and America, but the four-piece band was united on all fronts last night, delivering both the intimate vibes of a club show and the anthemic power of a stadium rock concert during its 75-minute romp at the jam-packed mainroom June 13.
Led by leopard-loving front-woman Emily Haines, the electric Canucks catapulted their stellar 13-song set with “Twilight Galaxy” off of their third – and most recent – full-length album Fantasies. Haines, who took the stage in a black- and- silver-sequined flapper-esque one-piece just after 9 p.m., fed off both a frenetic crowd and what is perhaps the tighest band in electro-pop ‘n’ roll.
It was, for the most part, a fun-loving and scintillating sultry performance turned in by Haines & Co., but here’s the thing: Metric (at least for this reviewer) is difficult to categorize – not that you necessarily should spend a whole lotta time worrying about it.
In a five-minute on-stage diatribe that might have made Pete Townshend proud, Haines herself questioned not only what piece her band plays in the greater popular music pie, but whether the Beatles or the Stones would have been signed in 2009.
“What’s all this Eleanor Rigby … or Sympathy For The Devil?” Haines said, mocking modern-day record execs. “It’s really getting ‘Hannah Montana’ out there.” It’s safe to say the indie-minded Haines could do without the commercialized aspects of today’s music business. And judging by her performance, she enjoys kicking it old school (at least in a 1980s sense). Throughout the band’s set, Haines was jumping up and down in place, shaking both her money maker and tambourine, not to mention her high-stepping, crawling along the stage, and overall playing the role of the greatest blonde frontwoman to hit First Ave. since Debbie Harry.
However, Metric’s opening acts weren’t as engaging.
The incongruously-named Smile Smile, a two-piece electro-folk outfit, fronted a Buddy Holly doppelganger, began strong with a country tune. But once the whinny twosome stopped playing heart-felt ballads and started on-stage bickering, the smiles faded and so did the crowd’s attention.
Meanwhile, Sebastian Grainger hit the stage running. Hell, I thought he was going to do a power-slide at one point. The big man donned a custom-designed white jumpsuit, replete with a hodge-podge of hand-sketched pictures (a dove with the name Prince under it) and phrases such as “Kids Stay Free,” and provided playful banter with the buzzing Saturday night crowd.
I’m gonna go out on a limb here and say that if Andrew W.K. and Franz Ferdinand stole a baby, taught it to shred and never spoke to it again, it would likely look, act and perform like Grainger. I’m hoping Grainger had his tongue firmly planted in cheek whilst doing Chuck Berry-esque guitar solos and rubbing his junk, but I’m just not sure, people. The dutiful Grainger was, at times, a bit much – but the always fun-loving Minneapolis crowd seemed to love it.
Nothing, however, compared to the performance turned in by Haines and the band (consisting of the expert delay-pedal marksmanship of guitarist Jimmy Shaw, the regimented bass of Joshua Winstead and varied drumming techniques of Joules Scott Key). And lest we forget the sonic and visual masterwork put in by First Ave.’s sound and lighting crews.
The electric crowd matched Metric’s intensity throughout the night.
Groups of college-age boys bounced wildly in unison to the band’s steam-engine single “Help, I’m Alive”. Haines flashed the power of her golden locks, whipping her hair from side-to-side during “Handshakes” and even caressed a porcelain puma while singing “Sick Muse”: Everybody just wanna fall in love/Everybody just wanna play the lead.
But last night – at least for lead-singer Haines – wasn’t just another stop on the tour.
“This is a band with many hometowns and Minneapolis is one of them,” said Haines whose father reportedly resides in near-by Hastings, MN. “There’s a lot of love here in general, and we’re just here to return it.”
Haines and Metric then gave props to University of Minnesota independent station Radio K (only later did she give a tip of the hat to the show’s sponsor 89.3 The Current) and began to get emotional recanting the band’s hard-fought road to the cutting edge of stardom.
The band often employed muffled electronic drum beats juxtaposed with beautifully charged electric guitar tones and numerous synths (at one point three members of the band were playing guitar in front of a keyboard).
But again and again it was Haines’ ethereal voice that made the night. It ended with Haines and Shaw (who had to have played a half-dozen guitars by night’s end – including a Fender Jaguar, Telecaster and a gorgeous 1961 Gibson SG), who were left alone on stage, topping off the evening with with an intimate, bluesy rendition of the band’s singalong “Live It Out” from the 2005 album of the same name.
Metric has played the Twin Cities numerous times over the past five years – some of them the stuff of legend. But after playing “Stadium Love” you get the feeling this is a farewell tour for the band’s ardent fans, and a springboard to unclassifiable and unquantifyable popularity.
Stevelknievel resides in St. Paul and has some pretty good ideas about a Modest Mouse biography.
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