The Automatik

House of Blues
September 27, 2003

Last time I saw the Super Furry Animals, they were so loud that my ears rang for two days. This time, I wisely remembered to pack earplugs. Sadly, they did not block out Grandaddy, who thankfully performed last and spared me from having to endure their entire set. It seems unbelievable to me that anyone would want to follow the phantom power of the Super Furry Animals, particularly Grandaddy, who I saw open for Elliott Smith three years ago and who didn’t impress me then.

The two bands were advertised as “co-headliners” so it’s not as if the Furries had to suffer the ironic indignity of warming up the crowd for a thoroughly gutless set by a group of schlumpy, bearded hipsters in trucker hats. Actually, the one guy in a shirt that fit, who vaguely resembled the male host from While You Were Out, had the most energy of all of them. The others just looked like Mike Love circa “Kokomo”�not an image that’s going to pump up anyone with a pulse.

I went to the show with my friend Jeanne, who had never heard or seen the Furries but who loved them as soon as Gruff Rhys opened his mouth to sing “Slow Life,” the last track on the new album. I was mighty pleased to hear it, as it’s one of my favorites and I wasn’t sure they would perform it. The set was mostly songs from the new album and Rings Around the World, one song I didn’t know, and the rabble-rousing “The Man Don’t Give a Fuck.” I was sorely disappointed not to hear anything from 1997′s Radiator, since I was hoping for “Herman Loves Pauline” or at least “Demons.”

Ah well. The Furries’ cheeky, political sonic assault worked wonderfully live, thanks to their authentic talent (Rhys has an absolutely gorgeous voice) and the ubiquitous video screen, which displayed not only promo videos for the songs, but various Eisensteinian montages. I was thinking that the show was less zany than the one I saw in Toronto last year, but then the band left the stage and reappeared in full Yeti attire, complete with bare Bigfeet, which they promptly propped up on the monitors. Brilliant.

I almost felt sorry for Grandaddy when they had to come on stage after all that. The wild reception they received was completely undeserved, however, as the singer sounds like Neil Young might were he pumped full of Xanax. The video screen remained, but instead of clever, contrapuntal imagery, it displayed boring, pretentious videos (all seemingly and inexplicably filmed in Toronto) and bad movies that had absolutely nothing to do with the music, including one of a “Native American” woman who lived in a house made of whale bones and fed raw fish to wolves and one dog that looked like a Pound Puppy.

After about 20 minutes of openly mocking the band and their pathetic excuse for music, Jeanne and I left and went down to Molly’s to visit Chris. That turned into a three hour long Shim Sham reunion of sorts, as we were joined by Suzie, Matt Vaughn, Joey, and Jeanette. While I was otherwise occupied, Jeanne got involved in a conversation with a girl who raved about the “amaaazing” Grandaddy but who curiously, had not attended the show. My theory is that for some reason, it’s cooler to say you like Grandaddy than to actually bear witness to their tediousness. It’s one more reason for me to despise hipsters and everything they stand for, which is apparently an insatiable desire to place pedantic posturing over and above anything resembling soul or emotion.