There are energetic drummers, and then there is Travis Nelson. Truly, he is 'Animal.'
Okkervil River albums have so much personality, the songs themselves become characters: players, people in the guise of animals or gods (and who can tell the difference sometimes?). And like watching a melodrama, we are witness to emotions that heave and plummet with frightening force. The songs can be drunken youth: the rotund boots on their feet knocking wildly on every surface. Or they can be villainous and smart, full of smiles and wishing-you-well up to the second they thrust the dagger into your belly. Pitched, lust-crazed, calculated: that is one half of an Okkervil album. The other emotion is equally intense in its thick, slow agony: the eternity it takes to remove the knife, knowing you have it all to do over.
And so it goes: soaring, drunk, angry, knife, stab, agony, pull-it-out-and-let's-do-it-again. At the San Fransisco Bathhouse in Wellington, New Zealand, on a crisp early autumn night, we were blissfully adrift for 90 minutes in Okkervil's choppy moods.
The stage at The Bathhouse is best suited for solo acoustic guitarists, DJs, 3-piece indie punk bands, or, at most, a quartet. Watching six musicians walk onto stage was like seeing a clown car act in rewind: you keep thinking, "surely they can't fit another one up there." But up there they fit, dressed sharply in black suits and white shirts. There was a bit of shuffling, slow turning to make sure Patrick's bass wouldn't take out Justin's eye, but always professional; never awkward or anxious. One got the impression this was not the smallest venue they had played in.
With the lights still low, Will Sheff begins what will be an unrelenting assault on the microphone with an apology for the idiosyncratic circus that is America's primaries, and to break the sad news that Obama had lost both Texas and Ohio. "If you had been holding on to hope, now's the time to let it go," he murmurs before screaming a fast version of "The President's Dead" that progressed seamlessly into "Black." The rest of the show played like a long-planned, well-rehearsed mix tape in that each song spoke to the next.
This is not to say that Okkervil River live is exactly the same as Okkervil River recorded. The band does not merely play tunes: they perform songs. While the rest of the band keeps time, plays each part precisely, Will is left to scream and sputter, or weave legless as he gives himself over to emotion. And although it appears at times that he's completely chopped--stumbling, twirling around eyes closed--the fact he never once bumped into anyone else on stage proves he is a sober performer: he knows exactly what he's doing.
Although Will Sheff is certainly the focal point, some of the loveliest moments were brought about by the other band members: how Travis Nelson kissed his drumsticks before charging into "Black", Patrick Pestorius's wry smile and dry wit ("Travis bought a cricket set yesterday . . . think we might introduce it to America because we're running out of professional sports"), the way Scott Brackett and Jonathan Meiburg mouthed the words to every song, and the humility of Brian Cassidy when it was announced to the crowd that this would be his last performance with the band. One of the sadder moments, true, but a testament to Okkervil River as a band. To paraphrase poet Albert Golbarth, they are tight, but highly unbuttoned.
(Please note I will make one small mention of the opening act, Ladybird, but nothing else: they were a dreamy French pop band with one nervous, Ritalin-starved guitarist. One bad apple, etc., etc.)
Okkervil River opens with "The President's Dead" after breaking the sad news that Obama had lost Texas to Clinton
Okkervil River, Wellington, New Zealand.
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