Sunday, August 22, 2010

This just in: Hipsters do sweat

Mrs A. and I headed out last night to the local Norman music club, the Opolis, to see the Wooden Birds (current band of Andrew Kenny who was the frontman of the late lamented American Analog Set).

The opening act was Dan Mangan. I assumed this would be a guy with a guitar, but it was a 4 piece band and they were great. Interesting tunes, funny lyrics, great energy and presence. It's not a total Jethro Tull situation though, the band's leader is a guy named Dan Mangan.

They kept saying how hot it was. No one had the heart to tell them that, for Norman in August, it was a cool night.

Wooden Birds were great, but they have the same problem live that the AAS did when I'd seen them. Their songs are all low key and mesmerizing which doesn't generate a lot of excitement in a club setting.

Plus, there were a max of 15 people there so that couldn't have been great from the musicians' point of view, though Dan Mangan was a ball of fire, coming out into the "crowd" to exhort us to sing along.

Both groups featured an excellent guitar player. I didn't get the name of the DM guy, but the Wooden Birds guitarist was Matt Pond.

Next month, Ariel Pink is playing here. It'll be interesting to see if anyone shows.

3 comments:

Jesse said...

Dr. A,

Great post. Just wanted to point out that the name is Dan Mangan with an N at the end. Glad you're getting the word out about up and comers, though!

Anonymous said...

What about methodologists?

Angus said...

Jesse: thanks, I fixed the last name in the post. I bought their two CDs at the show and listened to one today, it's really good!

Anon: Methodologists NEVER sweat.