Electric Six, We Are The Fury, The Resistors

I want you to imagine a scene: A surprisingly sparse, yet energetic, audience stands anxiously in the dark as Dick Valentine and the rest of Electric Six take the stage. Valentine is wearing a large cloak, but the lights are still too low to make out anything about the cloak. A few more moments pass, and Valentine moves to the microphone. The lights rise, and we see one Dick Valentine, beige suit and green dress shirt, covered in a violet velvet cape.

“Don’t tell me what time it is,” he commands us in a monotone that hardly suits the kinetic music behind him, “I know what time it is.” And before anyone in the audience can wonder what time is it, Valentine spins around, and the white block letters covering the back of the cloak tell us exactly what time it is.

It’s showtime!

So Electric Six began their frenetic set with a performance that was both kinetic and unexciting, exemplifying what makes the band such an amazing oddity to see in concert. Amidst hard, thumping rock — even while singing “Radio message from HQ/Dance commander, we love you” — Valentine stands with a straight face. Electric Six is the sort of band that, based on their sound, you would think to find the lead singer moshing in the audience. In comparison, Valentine’s performance is disconcerting, to say the least. Valentine isn’t without energy, but with him it comes almost out of nowhere. As if possessed by some bipolar demon, the energy waits patiently during verses, bursting out during choruses and instrumentals.

The small crowd, undoubtedly thinned by the concert falling on a Wednesday night, was also a little motionless at first. We moved about with something approaching verve until “Electric Demons”. The first track yet that night from the band’s breakout debut Fire, “Electric Demons” was…electrifying. The crowd perked up, and was in constant motion from that point on. Already lively, when the band finally played “Gay Bar” during the encore, the crowd just about exploded.

Throughout the show, we got to see the whole gamut of Valentine’s concert quirks. He didn’t dance as much as pretend to dance at times, pumping his arms in the air or moving them back and forth like some parody of How to Dance like a White Guy. And during an extended instrumental break, he dropped to the floor and started doing push-ups and sit-ups (which he did the last time I saw Electric Six, and I am glad to see it’s a trick he often pulls). The list could go on, but take the token Weird Friend in your group, imagine him starting a Detroit rock band that somehow mixes punk and disco, and you’ll have an understanding of Dick Valentine. Oh, and make sure that friend hates George W. Bush too, that’s key. It’s fantastic, in every sense of the word.

Despite the lack of attendance, two opening bands proceeded Electric Six: tour mates We Are The Fury and Pittsburgh locals The Resistors. A reverse flow of time dictates I first cover We Are The Fury, with whom I started off on the wrong foot. I was previously warned of the band’s terribleness, and seeing them dressed as pretentious hipsters (or is “glam rockers” the politically correct term?). However, their sound, which is closer to Fall Out Boy on the glam-punk scale, was certainly not terrible. What We Are The Fury lacked in creativity, they made up in spades with electricity (word of the day). Every member of the band, especially the leader singer, took to heart the maxim “rock out with your cock out”, moving quickly around stage and pushing the songs to their limits. And while the band sometimes struck me as an act going through the rock motions, that did not lessen their energy one bit.

Finally, local sibling duo The Resistors started off the night. Brothers Dave and Aaron make up the band, sharing duties on vocals, guitar, and drums. For that night’s show, Dave began on vocals and guitar, setting up the band as one removed from a White Stripes cover band. Jokes aside, The Resistors have a clear influence from The White Stripes, Bob Dylan, and The Black Keys. Especially when Dave is on vocals (Aaron’s voice is significantly smoother), the band is nasty, raw rock ‘n roll. Like any young band, the duo could profit from tightening their sound and focusing on the aspects that make them truly unique and worthwhile. Nonetheless, The Resistors are definitely a band I am going to keep an eye on.

Electric Six: http://www.virb.com/electricsix
We Are The Fury: http://www.virb.com/wearethefury
The Resistors: http://www.myspace.com/resistors

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