Yeah Yeah Yeahs - The Pearl @ The Palms Las Vegas 9/19/09

I am writing about my witnessing of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs show last Saturday night at The Pearl in The Palms in support of their third, and latest album, It's Blitz!.

If I had to use one word to describe this show, it would be energy. Who needs fossil fuels when you have Karen O? Harness a fraction of the energy that she expends during her performance on stage and this world would be just fine.

The stage had an interesting backdrop of a giant eyeball in the middle of five giant rings. It looked like the classic hypnosis graphic that you see on cartoons. The Pearl has some of the best acoustics in Las Vegas and tonight proved it. Even though I was seated and not in the throng of people in the general admission pit area, the sound was great!



The band opened the show with "Shake It", which I hear hasn't been played at all of the shows on this tour. Karen O was wearing leopard-skin tights with white short-shorts over them and a cape, to start with. Throughout the show, she would change her cape to a giant American Indian-looking blanket cape and a few other interesting garments.

They segued right into "Dull Life", which is a song that I really dig. The whole time, Karen O is a whirling dervish on stage. The crowd in the pit area was hopping all night. Nick Zinner was amazing on guitar as was Brian Chase on drums. They, too, had a very high energy level that was easy to feed off of even from where I was sitting.

They also played several more of my favorites including "Heads Will Roll" and "Soft Shock". I really liked Karen O's interaction with the audience. She would often stop and let the crowd finish lyrics during songs. One song in particular, "Cheated Hearts", she walked down to the front row and let at least 20 or more people take turns singing one of the two-note embellishments. This was very popular with the crowd.

After finishing up with "Zero", the band came back out for a three song encore. This included my favorite song of the night, a very slow acoustic version of the song "Maps". Karen O seemed to be genuinely choked up at the end of the song as it was a very stirring rendition.

I was tired by the end of the show due to working all day but I am glad that I was able to see one of the best bands that I had yet to see. If you are into high-energy, danceable music and upbeat stage presence, then the Yeah Yeah Yeahs are the show for you!

Viva! Karen O and the Yeah Yeah Yeahs!

K

Romance Of Young Tigers

I wanted to talk about a band that is now defunct but made enough of an impact on me to write about. The name of the band was Romance Of Young Tigers. They will leave a legacy of two releases to their name, both EP's.

A little background check shows that they were from Dayton, Ohio, and a two guitar and one bass band that never did find a drummer. Instead, they opted for the use of loops. Soon after the release of their second EP, they disbanded.

The first release, called I Have Supped Full On Horrors, was my first exposure to the band. They immediately struck me as unusual since I noticed the lack of any discernable vocals during my first time through it. Three of the four songs are over eight minutes long, one reason that the word "throwback" comes to mind as a general description for them. The use of bows on guitar is evident, leaving an immediate comparison to some of the works of Sigur Ros, without the vocals of course. There is a distinct use of feedback throughout their recordings. The third song, "The Sound And The Fury", sounds like it could have been a cast-off from the Sigur Ros album titled (). It is very mesmerizing and has ambient overtones, ambient of the 80's and not electronica ambient. It is a recording that could have easily been released by 4AD. It has structure in a non-traditional sense. You might even imagine it as part of a soundtrack, some foreboding overtones would lend well to a horror or indie thriller.



The second and final release was titled "Marie". It was recorded live in October of 2007 and contains no overdubs. This one really threw me for a loop. I immediately felt like I was thrust back into my 80's ambient period where minimalist styles, abstract classical or experimental noise was my choice of music. The first person that came to mind, as the first song "Marie Pt.1" started, was Brian Eno. Eno is a hero of mine and as this 15+ minute song meandered very slowly to audible sound, I imagined one of my first times hearing the groundbreaking recording called Thursday Afternoon. It has Eno-esque overtones but really had strong elements I remember from Pink Floyd's Saucerful Of Secrets. Very minimal droning, flowing sounds, creeping their way up in volume and intensity. I found myself imagining a seascape. A boat is on calm seas, minimal wind and a sun visible through the clouds. As the song moves on towards the end, the music is almost inaudible. It is like a calm before the storm. Then the second and final song begins, 17+ minutes in length, as a build up. It is more ominous with the use of a bass sound, almost like the bass pedal on an organ. Again, it builds up but this time it's like the clouds darken and the sun is now gone. A rumble of thunder in the distance and then it is upon you. The waves are becoming more and more violent, the wind is now a gale. The boat is starting to be tossed up and down with the violence of the storm. The music and volume then slowly ebbs to it's silent and watery grave.

Here is a very short, live video of the band that I found:



This style of music is not well suited for those into mainstream, highly-structured song writing and performance. It is beautiful and melancholy instrumentation that takes you on a voyage if you let it. It is intelligent, morose, image-provoking and subtle in many ways. You might even call it "stoner music for the 21st century", if you choose. I would recommend both of these recordings to anyone into abstract movie orchestration. The modern term used to describe this music is noise, it is anything but.

It is a shame that we will not be able to see more releases from this band. I would have really enjoyed seeing what direction that they decided to take their unique style of music. Oh well, I guess we'll never know.

K