Thursday, September 24, 2009

Yeah Yeah Yeah

I rarely attend concerts. The Pixies and Glen Hansard, aka The Frames, were the last bands I was lucky enough to see. But when I saw that my all time favorite punk rock garage band, Yeah Yeah Yeahs decided to grace the SLC with their presence I had to go.

Opening for the YYYs was Yacht, an indie electronica duo that have been supporting the YYY's on this tour. The girl/boy band dressed in contrasting black and white and with her bleached hair next to his black do', they evoked a ying and yang aura as they sung about the afterlife with an 80's flair set to deep bass lines. Though they only sung to the back beat, their energy on stage demanded your respect.

Yact left the stage smokin' and the audience stoked for the YYY's. Every light or sound check seemed to tease us and made the wait worse. But finally, after three years of enjoying the YYY sound and anticipating every new album release, the wait was over!

They absolutely rocked! Their setlist was more than I could have imagined. In fact after reviewing the YYY forum, I found we were able to witness songs that weren't played in other cities! The fans in these other cities hearts seemed to sink as they responed to the SLC setlist.

Karen O's performance was just as I expected; loud and obnoxiously energetic like an 80's jazzercise workout. Having explosions of Y shaped silver confetti rain over the crowd, watching Karen body slam the speaker stack and wind up her mic, spin it over her head, only to let it repeatedly crash to the stage at the end of the set (after sweaty encore) as a sacrifice to an utterly perfect and rockin' show, was euphoric.

Regardless of their rich kid-NYC upbringing the trio love their style of neo-garage punk and it showed. Look for Karen's classic voice in the upcoming movie "Where the Wild Things Are".