[concerts] Keane, Riviera Theatre (2/17/2005)

I should have known what I was in for when the line to pat down the women coming into the Riv was three times as long as that for the men. Keane's Tom Chaplin has that combination of good looks, a powerful voice and sensitive, emotional lyrics that make the twentysomething ladies swoon, along with a good portion of the thirtysomethings and the teens.

Anyway, we'll address Keane properly in due time. First up were The Zutons. On the one hand, they seemed a little too deliberately retro. On the other, the five-part harmonies at one point in their opening set were impressive. They seemed to be after the same kind of "loose but still British" vibe that Gomez nails so effortlessly, but they plod a bit too heavily to pull it off. And I got the distinct feeling that the band existed solely as a response to Christopher Walken's pleas for more cowbell on Saturday Night Live. The band used a lot of cowbell. Back on what could nominally be called the plus side, their drummer looked like he was straight out of a 70s sitcom, and from what little I could see of their lead guitarist's face, he seemed to be evoking Frank Zappa's facial hair.

Next up were local heroes The Redwalls. I had seen these guys a long, long time ago at Subterranean, and with all the hype and the major-label signing since then, was very interested to see what they had going on. Put plainly, I don't hear what all the fuss is about. I do, however, see what the fuss is about. The totality of the hook for this band is that they're a bunch of precocious kids playing music from before they were born. I'm not convinced that their throwback British blues, which at times reminded me of The Kinks, The Yardbirds, Derek and the Dominoes, Mott The Hoople, Wings and others amidst some more obvious nods to The Beatles and The Stones, can find a home on radio, and the lack of an agreeable format can absolutely kill a band nowadays. The difference is going to be how much face time these guys can get with the listening public. I don't know if the tunes stand up on their own without the context that they're, like, fifteen years old. We'll have to wait and see.

Which brings us back to the evening's headliners, Keane. There's no question, Chaplin is a fantastic singer. At times, he seemed a little too fantastic, with a falsetto so powerful toward the end of the main set that I almost swore it was pre-recorded. Which brings me to my main gripe about the performance. After the Ashlee Simpson Saturday Night Live "scandal," I seem to remember some quotes from Lorne Michaels that indicated that the use of pre-recorded tracks was a definite no-no on his show. Keane was the musical guest on last week's show, and I can say with absolute certainty that the band uses pre-recorded tracks. Pretty much all the bass parts, some vocal "effects" and at least one vocal harmony on one song were coming from somewhere other than one of the three guys on stage.

Of course, this is the "dirty little secret" of the music business both pre- and post-Ashlee. Nearly every big touring act uses pre-recorded backing tracks. For certain types of music, I understand it. Typically, you sequence tracks to add certain elements that are otherwise difficult to pull off live. My problem with Keane was that the parts weren't difficult to pull off live, they just took the easy way out. Hire a damn bass player, already.

Harmonically, the songs were quite interesting, which is pretty much par for the course for a piano-based band. You don't get locked into all the normal guitar chord progression tricks. The arrangements were all solid, with dynamics and contrast and all that good stuff. But there's only so much soothing, midtempo, predominantly minor music I can take before I want to go find a Les Paul and turn it up to eleven. I readily admit that, since lyrics are the last things I listen to, that I perhaps rely too heavily on the overall sound of the band, but when one of your only two uptempo tunes didn't even make the record, I think maybe you need to reconsider.