The Wily Filipino

Andy Bell / Postcoitus / Viva K, SF, 11/10/2005.

Well, I figured I'd strike out at some point, given my amazing concert batting average this year. This one pretty much sucked. Encouraged by the blurb that this SF show was one of only two where Andy Bell would actually sing -- including, so they said, "a few Erasure classics" -- J-Lu (who calls herself a "psychotic fangirl") and I arrived at the Mezzanine at 9 and the place was almost empty.

The first band was Viva K. Sorry -- lose Ashlee Simpson.

I actually rather enjoyed the second act, Postcoitus: two Oakland guys in running shorts and striped tube socks, blissfully stupid electroclash rhythms, strobelight abuse.

Andy Bell finally comes on around 11:45 and announces, much to our disappointment, that he would be playing a 90-minute set and finish up with four songs from his latest album. Well, boo. The music was good (I'm ultimately a dancing-in-place kind of person; J-Lu, apparently, doesn't dance unless it's a class requirement), but unfamiliar to me. I think I picked out Lipps Inc.'s "Funkytown," Avenue D's "The Punk Song" and New Order's "Jetstream" at some point. Far and way the most frustrating thing about the whole concert was Bell playing this fantastic remix of "Oh L'Amour," which seemed completely superfluous; after all, the singer himself was standing right there, just inches away from the microphone. By this point the crowd had thinned considerably.

Finally, around 1:30 (aside: don't DJs bother to beatmatch anymore??), he steps up to the mic and sings, just as he had announced, four songs from the new album (a great "Crazy," the first single). The bears and buff boys went wild. And then it was over.

Posted by the wily filipino at November 11, 2005 01:03 PM