The Wrong Way/The Right Way

There was a lot of disappointment in the air Sunday night, as concertgoers arrived to Chop Suey to find out that expected headliners You Say Party! We Say Die! weren't going to be playing due to visa issues. Seattlest was among the few that decided to stick out the show despite its 2/3 deficit of exclamation points in band names, hoping that Thunderbirds Are Now! would make up for the missing awesome. They did, but not after White Gold successfully demonstrated the "wrong way" to handle an underattended show.

White Gold took to the stage and went right into it, playing their high energy dance punk to a low energy audience of not much more than fifty, most of which stayed seated in the blocked off bar area. Crowd banter was NOT going to work for them, with silence as the only response to calls for claps or the jokingly posed, "Anyone have a shaker?" The annoyance was obvious from the lead singer, who treated the show like a practice session, playing with very little passion, following the previous query with a monotone, "I want to die. Anyone have a noose?" We have to admit it has to be hard for a band that thrives on feedback from the crowd to perform to an empty house, but really, there's no reason to take out your frustrations on the people that did show up. That's just bad P.R.. Seattlest thinks White Gold could be a very fun band to see in a packed space and we'll give them another chance, but based on Sunday alone, we'd have to write them off as well...whiny bitches. (Later, the band gave away free copies of their CD as consolation. Nice move, but a more motivated performance would have been better.)

Thunderbirds are Now! took the opposite approach to their performance, jumping, screaming, and clapping like Chop Suey was overcapacity. They politely asked the crowd to move up as they took the stage, setting the tone for all of their banter, which was incredibly softspoken considering the raucous sounds coming from the band in song form. Typically the lead singer is the focal point, but in this case it was keyboardist Scott Allen who drew all attention, climbing over equipment, bouncing incessantly, and otherwise acting one strobe light away from a seizure. The lead singer did his part as well, jumping into the audience, with guitar, on not one, but two occasions. You'd think this was the last show they were ever playing the way they carried on, and those in attendance were happy to see the band give their all, clapping when instructed and visibly energized by the performance. The show was far from punk rock critical mass, but Thunderbirds are Now! showed those lucky enough to be there why they are well deserving of the exclamation point in their name. DO NOT MISS THEM.

Image from flickr user peterl