Three Imaginary Girls' "Exile in {Imaginary} Guyville" @ Chop Suey

Liz Phair's musical legacy packed Chop Suey last night, as Seattle's indie rock scene turned out to wish Three Imaginary Girls a happy sixth birthday, and Phair's Exile in Guyville a happy fifteenth. In truth, the affair had an insider-ish feel, with a large number of people we recognize from the local music industry, due both to TIG's status as the local Pitchfork and to Exile's status as a cult album.

The six bands/artists who took the stage to play three songs each from Exile delivered a mixed show. Some of the covers felt a bit rough (to be expected), but more irritating was the fact that the bands were stage mixing, since mic-ing the gear would have made the downtime between sets too long; understandable, but it wound up sapping the energy from some of the more animated bands. That said, TIG definitely chose their artists well: Star Anna can blow you away on the strength of her voice alone; the Tea Cozies delivered a strong rock set and probably did the best to recreate the album's original vibe; but the stand-out was definitely Team Gina, the experimental retro hip-hop duo, whose version of "Flower" more or less sent the crowd into convulsions.

Compared to the review of Phair's own toothless performance of the album in Chicago on Tuesday, everyone at Chop Suey seemed quite happy that it wasn't Phair performing her own album. A strange legacy indeed. We saw Liz Phair a couple years ago, touring for Somebody's Miracle, a widely panned album, and came out with mixed feelings. Yes, she has sort of reinvented herself as a pop diva; her backing band of studio musicians is way too tight and colorless. But even so, the songs from Exile achieve an urgency that precious few records do. It's hard to describe exactly what it is about the album that makes us like it so much, but we actually found a review over on Pitchfork that captures at least some of the intoxicating brilliance of the record:

Men and women have written paeons to Phair since Guyville was released, putting her swagger, strength, and mundanity in whatever context meant the most to them-- "girl next door," "older sister," "younger sister," "easy lay," "slut next door," "bitch." But let's start with "female rocker." Guyville still runs up your spine on track one with its full-on opener, "6'1'", which is the best song she's ever recorded: tough but exposed, with cute feints in the lyrics, a wicked riff, and the door slamming open on her sassy tomboy vocals. On cuts like these, guys can dig Phair because she's one of the guys.