The phrase used to describe to me Will Oldham's (aka Palace, Palace Brothers, Palace Music, Bonnie "Prince" Billy) style was "postmodern-alterno-country-punk." Another friend described his style as "Faulknerian." On NME.com Jim Wirth calls Oldham Chris Isaak and Lyle Lovett's "evil little brother." All these descriptions are dead-on, although I have a hard time imagining Faulkner using a title like "You Have Cum In Your Hair and Your Dick Is Hanging Out."
The Polish National Home (aka Dom Narodowy, The Dom) is a turn-of-the-20th-century community hall founded when its neighborhood was predominately Polish. There are still more storefronts in Polish than English but gentrification has brought about Warsaw, a club held in the hall run for shows appealing to the younger, hipper, less first- or second-generation American crowd. The "r" in "Warsaw" is printed backwards. Otherwise, no changes to the décor have been made to accommodate the hipster audience.
The venue is a stage and big open floor with a high ceiling, two-row balcony in the back. The walls with are white with gold trim topped by electric candelabras with flickering orange bulbs. The finishing touch was the combination of enormous 19th century-style paintings of rustic nude scenes on either side of the stage and the disco ball in the ceiling. That, and cheap drinks.
Hint for groupies and wannabe reporters: get to the DOM about one hour before the doors open and walk in the side door like you own the place. I did this, thinking the doors had already opened and wandered into Billy's sound check. Daniel, the singer for The Pupils, walked in and I thought he was Oldham. I blanked on questions for Oldham so it's just as well. My pathological liar of a friend choked for once and we were kicked out. As a result of our lack of a cover story, we ate at the Polish American Café about five blocks away. We were served by cute waitresses and met with the dirty stares of regulars jealous of how English was our first language.
But back to the show. The Pupils, a duo from Will Oldham's recently adopted hometown of Baltimore opened. Their singer's name is Daniel and the guitar player's is Asa. They wouldn't give me their last names. Asa looks like your typical indie rock guitarist -- wool hat, factory worker jacket -- and plays a straight up, atmospheric rhythm to back up Daniel's surprisingly seductive Appalachian folk singer voice.
I wasn't sold on The Pupils' minimalist style until their fourth song, "The Mind Is a Whole In the Body." It's as heavy as you can get without a drummer or bassist. Between every verse Asa plays a rhythm guitar solo while Daniel plays a wahwah pedal with his hands. The dual soloing makes the distortions on the guitar subtler than you normally hear from a wah; you still hear individual strings strummed but they're bent and elongated as they are played, giving them an organic feel.
When The Pupils ended INK was supposed to come on but there was an unexplained delay. We waited a good 20-30 minutes, which wasn't all bad since I got to drink more. Zywies (pronounced "jiVEES") is a damn good beer: heavy enough to keep the munchies away while light enough to stave off nausea while at a concert with few accessible bathrooms.
Then INK, also from Baltimore, showed. When the drummer, Lyle Kisack, told me they never rehearse, I felt a little better about their performance. Watching them was like watching your friend's band play a frat house. You're psyched he's got a gig but you wish they had done more preparing instead of just getting high in the studio. The most remarkable part of their show came when the singer, Peter Quinn played a screeching oboe solo. It didn't save the performance, but it made me wonder what would have happened had Coltrane played with Dianogah.
Sometime in the night the lights shining off the disco ball were turned off, which is a shame. They lent a comfortable prom-night atmosphere to the place. I don't know exactly when this happened (cheap drinks) but I noticed their absence at some point during Billy's set. Oldham, who no longer sports a beard but a Civil War-era mustache, blew off this show, which hurts considering he was playing the grand opening for the club.
Some complain that the latest LP, "Ease Down the Road," is one whose beauty gets lost in the number of musicians on the songs. I disagree. While not as good as 1999's "I See a Darkness" it's the perfect album to put on before brewing your morning coffee.
Musician-overload was an issue in this performance. When the band walked onstage there were six people: drummer, organist, Oldham (on guitar), and three other guitarists. Sometimes they added an accordion, cello and another guitar, totaling nine. The layers of sound drowned each other out and bled into each other. Had one instrument been a banjo it might have been different, but the result was like Wilco, boring electric pop-country.
Oldham was too drunk to enunciate, even in his off-key, mumbling way. I was expecting stumbling and mumbling, but the man drooled on himself. And not in a good way.
The second song, "New Partner," had potential. It started out restrained, just some strumming, but the end climaxed with a sonic surplus and canceled out the heart-breaking "I've got a new partner riding with me" refrain. Had it just been Oldham on guitar and maybe a drummer, I am sure the effect would have been gut-wrenching. Instead it was noisy.
Will Oldham can show more ass-crack while showing less actual ass than anyone else I've seen. his ass is nearly non existent, but all of it was on display.
The third and fourth songs, "Madeline Mary" and "Break of Day," respectively, were both the most rock star performances of the night. "Madeline Mary" was played much looser and harder than on the album but the competing guitars once again drowned out the fun of it. "Break of Day" featured Oldham touching himself in the most Meatloaf-esque gestures of the evening but they failed to add perspective, humor or irony to a song about sleeping with a woman you know you'll break up with.
I don't want to give the impression that the show was a total bust. "All Around" started out silly, complete with antics, but climaxed into the atonal, desperate song I love so much. And the vocals on the title track off "Ease..." from organist Cindy Hopkins were as beautiful as on the album. In these performances we heard what was missing from the rest of the night: layered, dense music and passionate performances backing up the lyrics that expose the beauty and futility of even the cruelest of actions.
It upsets me to write a review like this of someone so gifted. I didn't enjoy the show and neither did my companions. Neither did most of the people there. At 1:30 AM, when the show let out and the audience was waiting for the subway, we all had the same "man, I was looking forward to this show so much" expression on our faces. The venue and audience were both begging for an evening of the potential caliber of this one. No one who already knew the Oldham canon will abandon him but the many potential newcomers probably won't join the club.
