Fleet Foxes with Espers at 9:30 Club

Last week, saw the band Fleet Foxes at the 9:30 Club.
The openers were Philly psychedelic folk band, The Espers. I love their music, but the Fleet Foxes audience were pretty chatty during the set. I'm glad they have a new record coming out in the fall, and I'm planning to see them play when they headline with Kurt Vile in Baltimore.
Fleet Foxes were good, but they really need to work on their stage show. They seemed to take forever to get ready betweeen songs, tuning and tuning, even with their guitar tech already tuning their instruments. When they played their songs though, it was lovely.

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Dead Weather with Screaming Females at the 9:30 Club

A little of a late post here, but saw the Dead Weather play at the 9:30 Club the night before their record Horehound came out. The openers, Screaming Females, from New Brunswick, NJ were a true revelation- the lead singer/guitarist was a tiny woman who could really belt it out.
The Dead Weather were pretty awesome live. Lead singer Alison Mosshart was a charismatic and sexy frontwoman, and Jack White on the drums was tight and formidable. The show reminded me of seeing Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds- kind of dirty, filthy rock and blues.
Towards the end of the set, Jack White took over guitar duties as well.

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The Walkmen at the 9:30 club

Last night, after the rains from Hurricane Hanna passed over, I went to the 9:30 club to see The Walkmen perform.
Opening up was a group called Golem, a band inspired by Eastern European and Jewish klezmer folk music. They were fun to listen to, and the violinist was gorgeous.
The Walkmen's new record, You & Me, is really good- they seem to have a knack for writing songs about the holidays and New Year's. Live, the new song "In the New Year" was amazing- Hamilton Leithauser's voice crescendoed into a scream in the chorus. They played a nice mix of songs from all their records. It was also nice to see Leithauser smile and banter between songs.
At the end of their main set, during "Louisiana", keyboardist Pete Bauer's son rushed up on stage in a small set of earmuffs and played the wooden sticks.

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The Breeders at the 9:30 Club

I went last night to see The Breeders at the 9:30 Club. It was actually my first time seeing them play, and it was great. They played songs from all their records as well as some Amps tunes. Kim and Kelley Deal were really fun onstage, and their voices sounded amazing. Honestly, they were more fun to see than the reunited Pixies shows a few years ago.

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Stephen Malkus & The Jicks with John Vanderslice at the 9:30 Club

Friday night, went to the 9:30 club to see Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks perform in a sold out show. Wonder why he didn't come to Baltimore because it's a title of a song on his new album. Oh well.
The opener was John Vanderslice, who I had heard of, but not actually heard before. Not too bad- he had nice songs and his band was good. He gave props to vegetarian Chinese restaurant Vegetable Garden in Rockville.
This was my first time seeing Malkmus outside of Pavement. Janet Weiss formerly of Sleater-Kinney was also his drummer. They were really good- I still love Malkmus' quirky lyrics combined with his always interesting guitar sound.
He is definitely a big nerd- I recall a reference to the word "Frak" during the show.

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