[New Orleans, LA] An in-the-meantime band. They were quintessential Midwest rockers – Cheap Trickian – basically the hard rock you’d hear in a bar. For instance, he had a Kum N Go t-shirt on. Borderline poppy punk, borderline heartland rock – i.e., power pop. It wasn’t your typical SXSW fare but we both enjoyed it. Oy oh! Just looked them up, realized they’re Reatard-affiliated (The Bad Times), we’ve seen them before & loved them, and this is why I have to keep notes. Apologies, Reatard disciples.

[Austin, TX] This band was on my list and I kind of regretted it. They fit my initial impression during SXSW research almost perfectly: “male 90s indie rock with kind of cheesy dated lyrics – they’re kind of good – think they’re on Thurston Moore’s label.” They put on an energetic show but it didn’t make sense – it was like seeing kids in their grandparents’ sweaters.

[San Francisco] An in-the-meantime band. Interesting. 80s flavored indie pop. Couldn’t help but notice the male bassist in a high bun and lipstick. Lots of reverb and echo-voice. Keyboard and tambourine. Some afro pop. They were definitely of The New Sound – with those high clanging guitars and the quiet and loud. I’d like to hear more.

[Austin TX] This band was the reason I was there. I don’t recall if I became interested in them because the WiseOne recommended them, or because they were linked to Godspeed You, or just generally because of their increasing notoriety right before I left Austin. I just know I intended to see them for a full year, never did, and decided their appearance in Houston was a ‘sign.’ The comfort of anonymity was shook by actually running into two of the ten people I know in Houston: the SexyLibrarian and the BeeryPhilosopher. Luckily they’re two I quite like. The opening bands had been a bit of a drag – the venue was just odd – but Balmorhea was everything I’d hoped for and more. Entrancing. I think it is incredibly hard to make instrumental non-vocal music engaging but they do it. They’re not as dark or eerie as Godspeed You, which puts them at a greater disadvantage as far as my ears are concerned. But I stood there waiting to hear what was coming next. There was something of Phillip Glass to them – the same mood. They’re brilliant musicians but it’s more than that – it’s the magical evocative combination of their sounds – I think they’re amazing.

Phillip Glass is probably the only composer I am aware outside of Angelo Badalamenti (David Lynch’s man). He does a lot of film scores, but they’re not the sort of film scores that are only suitable for background music. (I think I came to him through the movie The Thin Blue Line.) I find his music entrancing – it makes me think of alien landscapes – big vast empty spaces – uncomfortable things that are comforting, at least to me. Eerie and heartbreaking, but ultimately soothing. Anyway, I developed a picture of him in my head as a sort of underground avant garde genius, but it seems he’s more of a very well established widely traveled snooty sort of guy (at least at this very aged point in his life, and from his tortured old guy artist photo on the brochure I got). Seeing him in Houston’s version of artsy (lots of money) might also contribute to my new impressions of him. This is how it happened. I was pretty shocked to see that Phillip Glass was giving a FREE public concert at a local art museum, The Menil Collection. So I tracked the tickets online, signed up to get a free one within the first moments they were available, and they were already sold out. Free my ass. They were free to paying members of The Menil Collection, I’m guessing. I gathered my spirits, and decided The Menil people are ultimately good people and they probably meant free to the public in the sense that if you’re desperate enough you can sit in the park next to the tent where he’s playing and hear a slightly distant version of the concert. So I packed my sunhat, my pink bag, my pink chair, and hiked over there. Much to my dismay, this was no casual affair. A massive tent with very loud portable ACs attached at multiple points around the perimeter. Shuttle buses from some parking lot to the tent. Cops manning the crosswalks (which is nothing notable in Houston’s pretty neighborhoods) and “Menil guards” milling about, looking menacing, to me. I stepped to the side, stood under a tree, and starting eating my naive picnic lunch, assessing the situation. It looked grim. Ten minutes pass – the doormen are yelling at people on the lawn near me to take their seats before the show starts. It’s all very intense and exciting. Then things start to get sloppy, I see people walking in without any verification that they have a ticket! I gather my sunhat, chair, and picnic lunch, and take my chances. I waltzed through the door like nobody’s business, and secured an actual seat in the last row. So excited, even if I was seated next to the riffraff: people with babies and other freeloaders like me (kids from the neighborhood in inappropriately casual dress). I think they ended up not filling all the seats, and being ultimately good people, decided to let some stragglers in. I was about ½ mile away from the stage and, although I heard the two introductions from men congratulating The Menil Collection and Houston for this momentous day, the mic stopped working when Phillip Glass took the stage and I couldn’t hear a word of what he said. It was all piano – I’m assuming he’s all piano – and they had a screen with a close up on his hands. His sound was everything I expected, and there was a nifty brochure describing what he played though he didn’t really break in between ‘songs’ so I never knew where we were. But he played the songs (‘etudes’) he had created to keep his fingers limber and then songs that were actually in movies. He’s definitely a badass. I guess the most surprising thing to me was that his music had always sounded so minimalistic to me, but the visuals of him playing were anything but minimalistic: fingers moving at lightning speed (smoothly) and hands simultaneously going down different paths. After 45 minutes, I got restless – the seats were the size of ¾ a person. I wasn’t alone – I saw lots of backs starting to shift. I snuck out early, but very pleased with my Sunday afternoon adventure.

Houston’s Central Market doesn’t stand for any of that mamby-pampy yuppie world music that Austin’s Central Market couldn’t get enough of. I went outside to eat my lunch before shopping, for the fresh air, and was hit with a wall of cover-band-sound. There was bass, there was a diva of a lead singer with a beautiful afro, and they were loud! The Tommy Lee look-alike lead singer managed to add 3 times as much guitar to every song they covered. I walked on the porch to a cover of “Sweet Dreams” (which I’ve always been a sucker for) and stayed for Gloria’s “I Will Survive,” a Rolling Stones song, Romantics’ “What I Like About You,”… It was like karaoke with really talented friends. The lead singer, and the clear force behind the band, was there despite a flu and was dead serious – he was working his ass off to convince the audience and his band of their awesomeness. The bass player was skeptical and I caught him rolling his eyes more than once. There was also a drummer and the smallest keyboard player you ever saw. In another welcome change from Austin’s Central Market, the audience was predominantly black. Unfortunately, the only person dancing was an old white man with chops – he nearly threw the diva off her game.

Two young, potentially very young, boys with man-size attitudes. Skinny baggy jeans (an amazing conquest of the modern day). One had a Puerto Rican flag draped over the front of his jeans- it was a little too flag-as-penis for me, but the mix of nationalism and machismo definitely worked for him. They bounded on stage yelling “Grito!” and laughed at themselves a little when they saw the tiny audience of parents and little kids (it was still early in the day). They rapped (in Spanish mostly) but with dance-melodic flow – there was most definitely some auto-tune in there, and what sounded to me like video game sounds. My 13-year-old niece could explain it better. They knew how to put on a show, backed by a girl in a net shirt half dancing/half stroking herself, and two somewhat awkward boys fly dancing. One tall slim dark woman with bleached hair danced the entire set with her Puerto Rican flag flying in the style of a high school drill team. It was entertaining and heartening.

[Montreal]: I loved, loved, loved this band – they’ve got a retro sound that manages to be modern and special – ethereal poppy female vocalizing over shimmering guitars – some combo of 80s soft rock, synth pop, and disco – synth yacht rock? Bluesy French pop with psychy soft rock instrumentation? – in same school as MGMT maybe but more pop than psychedelia –a more sincere Cansei de Ser Sexy – kind of Blondie – fairy disco: all high notes and ethereality but still rocking – they were loungey and groovy, simple and complex – I admired their ability to restrain themselves and pick the perfect notes – the kid with a fluff of hair on the front of his head played drums – the kid in the old man sweater played the flute – the kid with the sculpted afro in slouchy baggy-skinny-pants played bass – the girl in a black crop top and black mom jeans played keyboards and provided the vocals, her incessant hair flipping (she looked like F. Bueller’s girlfriend) annoyed me but she managed to seduce the audience very effectively – my favorite though was the bleach blonde kid playing electric guitar in black skinny jeans and an awful color-block jacket (amusingly, I think the yuppie older couple in the front were his parents)

[Portland]: I’m not a huge fan of the House of Blues chain, so this was a nice change of pace – small minorly hipster bar that provided me with my first sparkling wine in a can ever, with a straw attached, enchanting – they also had lots of posters for Coathangers shows, which is a band I tried and failed to see at previous SXSWs, and it turns out they’re from San Diego and frequent this place –it turned out that the majority of the audience, at least initially, was the other bands – this band made me nervous at first glance, Oregon oatmeal, very earnest – they were a guy on guitar singing and a redhead on a cello accompanying him with some “woos” – I ended up really liking them – the guy was a soulful crooner (a la Buckley) – they had great melodies, sounding like Iron and Wine or Mumford & Sons sometimes and more plucky at other times – the rhythm and vocals were solid – the redhead cellist was fascinating – she was very youthful with her long red waves and no makeup but I suspect she’s a black-humor feminist under it all – she’s drama personified – her playing was really good, providing bass and slaps – she gave them a Loreena McKennit quality – they reported later in their show that they were usually a five-piece and were having to make up for the missing band members – they were unique, beautiful , sincere and joyful

great name – competent classic rock and 80s hits cover band

More than anything, the current Erasure tour is about lead singer Andy Bell’s vocals. Every single song allowed Bell to stretch his voice to the rafters. In fact the new tracks, including the stunning I Lose Myself and the club-ready A Whole Lotta Love Run Riot, seemed custom-designed to showcase that voice.

Erasure have a back catalog spanning twenty-five years, and they reached way back for the b-side Push Me, Shove Me and the crowd favorite Oh L’Amour. The new songs fit right in but somehow it was the older tracks where Erasure truly found their groove. It wasn’t just a function of being familiar. The songs from early in their career, like the frenetic Drama and bouncy singalong Sometimes, just worked better tonight. Those songs found that balance between allowing Bell to roam wild and Vince Clarke’s intense love affair with the soundscape of Erasure’s songs.

Blue Savannah is consistently one of my favorite live tracks (nothing beats Clarke in a cactus suit playing guitar on an acoustic-tinged Blue Savannah during the Cowboy tour), and the backing vocals tonight were layered brilliantly behind Andy Bell’s soaring lead vocals giving the song a fresh new feel. Twice, Bell favored the lower register for a song, including Tomorrow’s World lead single When I Start To (Break It All Down). He must have been saving his voice for other tracks because A Little Respect was belted out with an intensity that sent waves of energy through the crowd.

The sound mix was a little muddy in the House of Blues, and it was distinctly noticeable on the ballads. Alien was just a sonic mess. The acoustic elements were completely lost and the backing vocals smothered Bell’s. A similar problem affected Always and Ship of Fools. But for whatever reason, the dance tracks didn’t suffer the same sound issues.

Erasure knows how to get people off their feet, and they had the crowd hopping from the pulsing intro to Love to Hate You straight through to the last note of Stop. Once again, Andy Bell sounded fantastic. With the new album’s release still a month off, it is always good to hear from them again.

Erasure setlist
Sono Luminus
Always
When I Start To (Break It All Down)
Blue Savannah
Fill Us With Fire
Drama
You’ve Got To Save Me Right Now
Ship of Fools
Chorus
Breathe
Victim of Love
Alien
Push Me Shove Me
Love To Hate You
I Lose Myself
A Whole Lotta Love Run Riot
Breath of Life
Chains of Love
Sometimes
A Little Respect
Encore
Oh L’Amour
Stop!

as the name would suggest, they mix zydeco with punk – Rockboy foresaw Pogues and I foresaw gypsy punk, and that’s about exactly what we got – they were terrific – very Gogol Bordello – lots of passion – they’d played a show until 3am the night before and were at this show by mid-morning – this was the best venue of the whole festival, just a field – no bureaucracy, tons of good food stands, and everybody mellow in their little fold out chairs – we started feeling like locals once we picked ourselves up some of those chairs and settled in with the middle aged folks – this band inspired some truly creative dancing from the audience – the kind of band you’d want to have at your wedding, even if you’re not Greek or Jewish

Rockboy saw this band the day before and raved over their zydeco fantabulousness – I think zydeco is the ugliest music in creation but turns out it’s the danciest music in creation – they were just a bunch of fugly guys in the tackiest bar EVER but everybody wanted to be at their party – appears I’ll need to look into zydeco a little bit more

[Brooklyn, NY] girl on keyboard – ah ah harmonizing between a girl and boy – pleasant dance rock – they weren’t an intentional see but they were good

[Austin, TX] nooo!!! – if I’d known they were local, I wouldn’t have allowed this stop – as it turns out, they were one of my top three bands of SXSW 2011 (yay Austin!): everything good about the 70s – and they must have emerged from the womb arena rockers, because I swear the lights got brighter the second they came on stage – they started with a slow southern rocker but pretty quickly shifted into very very exciting disco rock – they were slick and sexy – kind of remind me of Chili Cold Blood now that I think of it, though bigger and prettier – ThinLizzyLover: “I hate them and like them”

[Queensland, Australia] they were exciting right from the start with their 3 excruciatingly pretty boys (guitars and drum), 1 gothic-looking two-dimensional female fiddler, and 1 three-dimensional Hawaiian-looking female vocalist with a pom pom on her shoulder – the vocalist ruled the stage as did her bad-ass fiddler pal – she fiddled like the she was trying not to make a deal with the devil – they were some crazy mix of indie rock and dance music – they made me think of The Gossip and The Eurythmics – they’re kind of 80s synth pop too – I’m definitely not one to dance but this band made me wish I was in a room alone with a gay boyfriend – ThinLizzyLover is mad for them

[New York, NY] skinny white man on an acoustic guitar with a butter voice – accompanied by an electric bass, trombone, drums, and sometimes a sax – but then he was more soulful angsty as was the music – and then they were a band for children (“I don’t want to go to the candy store anymore”), sure, it was about how at least he’s addicted to candy instead of auto asphyxiation, etc., but as far as the me and the kids in the audience were concerned, they were one of those bands musicheads go to once they have kids and can’t stay out late – the two really little boys at the next table to me were loving it – the one who was about 5 was all rapt attention and shiny eyes, obviously in total agreement about the lure of candy stores – the other one, maybe 8, was practicing piano scales with his fingers on the table – Rockboy liked this band a lot more than I did, but they were high quality and diverse at least

I don’t necessarily follow this band but they definitely stood out amongst the masses of current indie bands – two effortlessly remembered songs (“Cowbell” and “In Houston”) … and Rockboy was made to go… and they happily turned out to be much better than I expected – all krispy flaky guitar and bass: crisp, fast, and rich – they’re less indie and more dance-y southern rock funk – they’ve got character and soul – guess I will have to be a follower now

I’d been hearing about this band as long as I’ve lived in Austin (a pretty long time now) and had never seen them so I was excited – they did not disappoint – I would like to credit DetroitRockGirl for her 50% success rate: Grand Champeen – yay!, Centro-Matic – nay… they were electric and I’m not talking about their guitars – they took to the stage and were immediately in sync and in animation – it was organized chaos and joyful pogo-rock power pop – plus they all seemed like guys you’d want to hang out with: genuine, smart, and nice – I think the Soul Asylum comparisons are because of the main vocalist – when the bassist sang (also a very nice bartender at the Hole in the Wall), I was taken back to 90s indie rock with that atonal falling-down feeling – both singers were good and the diversity was nice – there was also notes of country rock and maybe some Weezer for a second there – we also happened to stand next to their #1 fan, who was completely beside himself at finally getting to see the “#1 live band in Austin” after a long hiatus of no shows – he was also completely sober and spent many minutes discussing why I should love this band – we’re both hoping they keep having shows

[France] “Those, those beautiful boys / Those, those beautiful boys / Born illegitimately / To a whore, most likely / He became an orphan / Oh what a lovely orphan he was / Sent to the reformatory / Ten years old, was his first glory / Got caught stealing from a nun / Now his love story had begun” – those lyrics are pretty much why I went to this show – and because I think their general sound is pretty remarkable – [on a side note, you've got to hear how they sing the song to really appreciate it, and, as usual for me, it was not played at their live show which I sadly realized was because it features Antony from Antony and the Johnsons who was not touring with them] – it ends up I may have been more enthused about the crowd than the band, but the band deserves a lot of credit for the crowd – so the crowd was fantastic – some mix of neo psych hippies, ravers, plain old burners, steam punks, and some unfortunate ones in renaissance garb – the common theme was iridescent eye paint or painted-on pencil moustaches on girls, which I came to find out was part of the whole CocoRosie cult I didn’t know existed – surprisingly, at least to me, there were also lots and lots of lesbians – I’m always confused as to how the lesbians unite and figure out which bands they love but turns out one of the sisters is a lesbian plus the band promotes drag, androgyny, etc. – there were also an awful lot of young females falling out, e.g., being carried out because of excess consumption – not sure if it’s because the crowd was pretty young or if the band attracts a druggier crowd – anyway, the band is comprised of 2 sisters who are artistes in every sense of the word – one had long romantic hair and sang in an operatic voice (properly trained) and plucked a harp – the other one with the squeaky baby voice that defines CocoRosie (at least to me) strutted around with male attitude and had a baseball cap on top of a feminine doo-rag on top of long brown hair – I much preferred her – there was a keyboardist guy and then a little unassuming guy who did a human beat box solo that was amazing and referenced actual American hip-hop songs – their music is a lot more diverse than I was aware of before the show – they manage to incorporate electronic, hip-hop, classical, and pop into a sound that ends up being pretty distinctly theirs – many bizarre instruments come into play – I think the thing I liked most about their sound is that they play childhood innocence off of the dark realizations of growing up and seeing stuff – especially with the two sisters interplaying their vastly different attitudes and sounds (think Enya intermixed with ghetto dance rap), it’s a bizarre but beautiful marriage of cultures (which I am always a fan of) – so I thought they were from France and assumed their inclusion of rap and the bad sister’s headdress was a nod to the French Muslim outcasts – I also assumed their air of hipster superiority was a product of general French superiority, but turns out, they’re American, and the superiority is a product of New York – the good sister moved to France early on to study opera but the bad sister moved to Brooklyn to party at Kill Whitie parties – those parties are a whole other conversation, but the sisters are worth looking up in general because of their interesting backgrounds – other notes of interest: 1) Rockboy overheard a couple mating in the outhouse bathrooms, 2) the most shocking girl was the one in a modest dress with granny panties that clearly shone through (a lesson to the young girls) , 3) the bad sister moistened her clarinet in her beer like the bad ass she is, 4) Rockboy happily gave up all claims of being a hipster once he realized that hipsters are now parting at the back of their skull and combing their hair forward, and 5) there is a series of really interesting photos of the sisters that do a nice job of expressing their artistic vision

also a 2nd wave ska band from the late 70s on the 2 Tone label more recently noted for the song playing as Ferris Bueller runs through backyards and houses to beat his family home – so we were optimistic at the start – the lead singer had a cute British accent – the band was good – it was pretty quickly clear, though, that there was something lacking – that energy! the quick pick-up of ska – it finally became clear that they just weren’t playing ska – maybe some sort of pop-rock inspired by ska but not ska – the early part of the set reminded me of The Talking Heads, kind of – the pop-rock became decreasingly ska and increasingly soul-pop – like a mix of 90s artists Soul Decision and Shaggy – by the end, it was full-on reggae – I preferred the reggae to the watery rock – reggae would have been okay if I hadn’t come expecting ska – 2 hours of unska was not okay – Rockboy insists they were playing poorer versions of their recorded material and/or the worst of their recorded material – I insist this band is not for me

we thought he was going to be the first band and he should have been the first band – it’s not that he was bad but he was a ska-pop (which sounds remarkably like afro-pop) lone singer on a guitar!! he sounded like an acoustic Matisyahu! Vampire Weekend! – would have been great if you chanced upon him in a coffeeshop – big deflation in crowd energy but luckily he only played for about an hour

we were immediately biased by one of the band member’s girl friends who informed us the musicians were accompanying the singer in hopes of saving a sorry performance – according to her, the musicians play with several local bands and are well respected (which seemed reasonable given the performance), while the singer gets around but not with a lot of respect, kind of like some girls we know – unfortunately, this reminded me that his myspace page quoted a review that said “these guys aren’t bad” and then tried to say that the reviewer is hard to please! best not list that review – he wasn’t awful by any means but he didn’t really redeem his reputation by only playing covers, and pretty obvious covers at that (Willie Nelson, Johnny Cash, etc.) – if he were your friend and you didn’t live in Austin, you’d think he was great

Cyndi Lauper put together a blues band for her tour and stuck to all but a handful of new songs on the setlist. She was fiery onstage (even with the choice of toxic-red wig) and she was clearly enjoying herself.

The opener Just Your Fool was a good example of why Lauper is a fuckin’ pop star no matter what she’s singing. It was a barn burner. The best tracks from the new album, Memphis Blues, shone onstage when they allowed her to use her vocal range. Down so Low and Don’t Cry No More were the best examples, uplifting anthems as powerful as anything from her past catalog.

The show was divided into an hour long set of songs from her blues album, closing with the non-album track Wild Women Don’t Get the Blues (available on digital editions). The second set was a mere five songs deep, but she delivered them with a blues-touch and jammed out for a full forty minutes. Starting with the weepy ballad Who Let in the Rain and then leading into Change of Heart, Girls Just Want to Have Fun, and Time After Time, that was it for a run-through of the hits. The songs were fantastic, given a blues treatment and transformed into sing-a-long crowd-pleasing extended jams.

For one last song, she emerged on stage with just her guitarist for a tearful take on True Colors wrapped in a bit of John Lennon’s Power to the People.

Cyndi Lauper setlist
Just Your Fool
Shattered Dreams
Early in the Mornin’
Romance In The Dark
How Blue Can You Get?
Down Don’t Bother Me
Down So Low
Rollin’ and Tumblin’
Wild Woman Don’t Get The Blues
Break
Who Let The Rain In
Change Of Heart
Girls Just Wanna Have Fun
Time After Time
Don’t Cry No More
Encore
True Colors

[Stockholm, Sweden] out of all of the many female-vocalist semi-retro bands we saw (thanks to the Rockboy), this was my favorite – Miss Li had a genuine edge and sang creatively and enthusiastically while pounding on her little keyboard – she didn\”t seem like she was acting but like she was really just that passionate and that much fun – they\”re really less retro revival and more indie pop inspired by retro jazz and blues – she was backed by a guitar, drums, a sax (I think?) and an upright bass, but we particularly enjoyed the two very Swedish looking gents – oddly, we\”d tried to see her earlier at an outside stage, even willing to brave ridiculous 40 degree weather, and been told she\”d gone home due to the weather

[Baltimore, MD] I wanted to see her badly because she\”s 1) a female rapper, 2) from Baltimore, home to Spank Rock and The Wire (I know), and 3) features M.I.A. in several songs – the last reason was the only one that convinced Rockboy to join me – so her DJ was too repetitive and simple to compare her to M.I.A. but she was fast and cute – hard dance rap as you\”d expect from Baltimore – best part was the two matching MALE dancers flanking her all elbows out and knees up, seemed more inspired by traditional African dancing (super sped up) than hip-hop dancing – really liked the dancing – the 2nd floor bar was filled to capacity but with everybody crowded into 1/2 of the bar to see the 2nd stage – when the floor started bending and shaking, Rockboy and I made plans to save ourselves by jumping on the bar when the floor collapsed

[Memphis, TN] thin graceful boys singing that looked like magical kids singing saccharine sweet happy pop – reminded me of 60s jangle pop and the 60s in general – they were pretty good and a nice change from the same-old indie sounds – lead singer had a jean jacket with “Punk and his hunx” painted on the back

[Colorado] best rap show I saw – a tall lanky black guy with a bowtie tattooed around his neck – incredible dynamism and demand of the crowd, coming right to the end of the stage with a habit of bending from the waist to sing in two halves – he charmed me by switching off the intensity to smile uncertainly and kind of giggle or to lean down and ask the white punk in the front if the sound was okay – brought two pals up to do a hardcore number and then went solo to do a booty-shaking dance rap number “for the ladies” – it was clear he was odd in a very intelligent way – lots of diversity, lots of intensity, and lots of quality

[New Orleans, LA] a band Rockboy discovered in SXSW research that led us to Jay Reatard\”s tribute – they were described as an inspiration for Jay in the little pamphlet memorializing him – they were not Reatard-punk but totally illuminated his sound – they were perfect power pop with a punk edge and I mean perfect – they were a terrific band – the lead singer was a non-shirt wearing sweaty large man and it didn\”t even matter – they were loud and fast and hard but had perfect melodies and lyrics and hooks – a top show

[Alliance, OH] lite alt-rock – anthem rock with big sound like Coldplay – boring

[Richmond, VA] all I wanted to do was see The XX but somehow everything was a mess and I was watching some slick emo band – I appreciated their musical prowess and their confidence but just not my style – the best part was the free Taco Bell tacos offered by women walking around with them in original wrappers on upheld trays – a lame but tasty attempt by this venue trying hard to pretend it was elite

[Copenhagen, Denmark] the music was good (disco pop rock) but they were remarkable because of the lead singer – she was a gorgeous tiny blonde girl with a neon pink outfit and about 100 necklaces and a knowing sneer of a smile and she actually could sing – maybe a modern Debbie Harry – they had two horns, keyboard, guitars.