On The List :: Friendly Fires @ Webster Hall [12.5.09]

This review also runs on Bowery Presents' House List Blog.

I will cop to the following assumptions about Friendly Fires' Saturday night show at Webster Hall: 1) It would not sell out. 2) Friendly Fires would be great but people wouldn't "get it." 3) I would struggle with a show that, truthfully, wasn't great. Sitting in an establishment slightly south of Webster on 3rd Avenue, I thought these things. More than thought, I was sure of them. These assumptions were just before 8pm. By 10:30, they had been destroyed, exploded and rebuilt in a new image like a forgotten sports arena and its new, improved replacement.

Webster Hall was packed in the way it gets packed when everyone who bought tickets actually shows up and wants to be close to the stage. Not every band does this to a venue; the buzz, the sense that something incredible might happen. Not two hours ago I discussed my theory of big venues and how nothing unexpected can happen because of their size and sterility. But the potential energy in the room was almost suffocating. I edit. Nothing exciting happens in big venues ... until it does and then, bluntly: It is on.

Friendly Fires crushed the crowd from the outset. Opening with "Lovesick" and playing "Skeleton Boy" third, it was clear they would hold nothing back. Lead singer Ed McFarlane, an explosion of energy, shaking and shivering around the stage like a man possessed never let up, even excoriating us to, "Dance, people." The second-half of the set threw the pedal to the floor, rolling through "Photobooth," and "On Board," (maybe the most frenetic moment of the night) and closing with the anthemic, "Paris." The band received a well-earned, slow-clap encore and returned to play "Ex-Lover." The chorus, "you're all I need," echoed through the hall and I had been more than proved wrong. This band proved themselves completely and amazingly right: A monolith of proportion in public sound and proof that when the walls and floor shake, it means you're being broken down only to be rebuilt.

Listen :: Friendly Fires - "Jump In The Pool"

Friendly Fires :: "Skeleton Boy" [Video and Single Release]

Friendly Fires turned in one of the best records and best singles ("Jump In The Pool") of last year. But "Jump In The Pool" wasn't the best song on the album. It was the only song produced by Bloc Party creationist and super-producer Paul Epworth. You had to wonder why Epworth wasn't lending a hand elsewhere. And for the single release, finally, of "Skeleton Boy," back comes Epworth to rework the album version of the song into something that is twitchier, more blip-hop, and entirely satisfying. Which means, one of the best songs from last year just got a lot better.

The video might be the best part of all, where the band dances and revels in a world of exploding packing foam. And the track's opening line, "I close my eyes on the dancefloor/and forget about you" seems less tragic and more pragmatized. Maybe even a little fun.

Listen :: Friendly Fires - "Skeleton Boy" (Single Mix) [via mediafire]

Friendly Fires :: "Lovesick"

The Friendly Fires album came out yesterday and just wait, it's going to knock down your doors. We caught them at the Mercury Lounge a few months back and it was immediately apparent that this band is on the up. They didn't look or sound a bit like a band playing to 60 people on a weekday night. The only disappointment being: they didn't play "Lovesick," which at the time had just poked its head above the Internet's surface, only to look around and then go back under. Luckily, we've got a copy of the song which might be the most approachable, if not the empirically best, song on the album.

Listen :: Friendly Fires - "Lovesick"

On The List :: Friendly Fires @ Mercury Lounge [7.28.08]

If you look down at the stage, you can see the Friendly Fires set-list. God, it's very nicely typed and it has eight-songs on it. Look at that font! The subtle curvature, the palatable contrast. Is that squid ink on a white 8 and 1/2 by 11? Or is it bone? It might even have the date of the show on it. The whole thing is a little overwhelming. Their tour manager might as well be Pat Bateman. But the three-out-of-four boys in collared shirts know something we don't. They're about to rip this set-list into a million little pieces.

Absurd statements: 1) Friendly Fires have a 70 percent chance of becoming the Britpop LCD Soundsystem. 2) Friendly Fires could be one of the biggest (little) bands of 2009.

Almost immediately the lead-singer starts bending at the waist and losing his mind. It's a little before 10 o'clock on the east coast and Friendly Fires are determined to not act like an opening band. Every bit of their affect is that of a headliner. In the next 30-minutes, people are going to totally forget that Modey Lemon is even playing later. And just like that, Friendly Fires are on. The lead-singer encouraging the sound guy (or maybe just everyone) to turn up the volume. It would be about 3am in London and the crowd starts to act like it.

Two truths and a lie: 1) Friendly Fires enjoy the use of the cowbell. 2) Friendly Fires are absolutely burning this place to the ground. 3) Friendly Fires have five members.

They play a tight set rife with energy. And it's not manufactured energy either. This is the kind of enthusiasm that doesn't come from preparation or polish. It comes from somewhere else, somewhere far more earnest and far more true. The contagion spreading out from the stage and into the rapidly more animated audience is something that aspires to be nothing besides itself. It is something opposite of fake. What is happening inside the Mercury Lounge is, on at least one level, valid.

The take-away: 1) This band will be back in America. 2) By the time they are it won't be in a room this small. 3) This isn't a Myspace band. Don't spin a couple tracks through your computer speakers and think: "it's sort of post-punky and a little dance-rocky. I guess it's okay." If you think this you will be woefully underestimating this band. If you think this, you will be wrong. If you don't go see this, you won't see it. That is a tautology and maybe less useful than it could be. Sometimes you just want something to be true.

Water has spilled all over the front of the stage. Mixed with the spasmodic movements of Friendly Fires' lead-singer, the pristine set-list at his feet is torn to shreds. This is the end of their last song and nothing could be less important. You could make the argument that they had to destroy this pretty little piece of paper to get to where they are tonight. That would not be true and no one likes a liar.

Listen :: Friendly Fires - Jump In The Pool