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Phoenix at Mean Fiddler, 2006
French Indie-Pop band Phoenix has enjoyed a steady growth in popularity since 2003, when Sophia Coppola featured one of their songs in her film, Lost in Translation. A friend introduced me to the band at home in California shortly after they released Alphabetical in 2004—their second album on the Source label—and I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to see them perform live in London. Phoenix released a new album, It’s Never Been Like That, in May 2006, and they made a stop at the Mean Fiddler in SoHo to promote it. Arriving at the Mean Fiddler on an abnormally sunny evening and with two roommates in tow, I was hoping that the new music would be as infectious as Alphabetical, but, as I hadn’t heard the new record and had never seen Phoenix perform live, I had no idea what was in store.
The band, a foursome including vocalist
Thomas Mars, bass player Deck D'arcy, and guitarists Laurent Brancowitz and Christian
Mazzalai, were joined by two additional musicians on drums for the set. Phoenix has been together in their current formation since 1997; they
recorded and produced their first album on their own, and met with such success
that they were promptly signed by the Source label.
The concert started with a bang, and Phoenix played
songs from albums old and new, including my personal favourites, “I’m an Actor”
and “Run Run Run.” The songs were longer
in concert than their recorded counterparts and included more
instrumentals. Phoenix is pretty good
live, but different; there was a delightfully annoying moment during “I’m an
Actor” when Thomas extended a pause between words for so long that the audience
started grinding their teeth When he
finally breathed out the long-awaited word, “late,” the floor-dwelling mob released
one large, collective sigh of relief. Thomas,
in a self-effacing style that would continue all evening, thanked the audience for
their applause, saying “Merci” as if he had been worried we wouldn’t like him.
Phoenix plays to play and their lack of circus-like antics is pretty
remarkable in this age of fog machines, strobe lights, fireworks and backup
dancers. The extent of their stage show
included lighting that alternated between blue, white and red, growing dimmer
as the music requires, and flashing brightly in moments of fast-paced
panic.
Although their focus was on their music, Phoenix does know
how to play to a crowd. Somewhere around
the middle of the set, vocalist Thomas sat down on the edge of the stage and
sang to the audience before climbing up onto the barrier and leaning in,
physically greeting and meeting the crowd.
He appealed to the crowd in that same self-effacing manner frequently
throughout the set, told us, “We’ve got a new song. We just practiced yesterday, so please, be nice,”
and encouraged us on more than one occasion to “throw your hands up in the
air!”
The new songs have a similar sound to the
previous albums, especially in the bass and rhythm—I have a feeling that
they’re recycling the same old bass lines over and over again—and it
incorporates an odd wailing that is not typical of their style as far as I know. There was definitely more “whooing” and “ooing”
than was found in Alphabetical.
By
Summer Song
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