KEVIN DREW + Los Campesinos! @ Le National

By Simon Howell - A Listening Ear - 12/06/2007

It’s funny how expectations work. A couple of years ago, I went to a Libertines concert -- not to see them specifically (I thought they were over-hyped and undercooked), but instead to catch a rare stateside appearance by Wales-based post-punk band Mclusky. Most of the audience didn’t seem to agree, but I thought their taut menace and sly wit easily outpaced the more popular headliner.

So it’s perhaps understandable that I sympathized with seven-strong opening act, Los Campesinos!, even secretly expecting them to show up the national juggernaut that is Broken Social Scene with their youthful vigor and caffeinated tunes. I greatly enjoyed their sole release, the Sticking Fingers Into Sockets EP, plus, well, they’re Welsh. The record is an ebullient collection of spiky, lightly-orchestrated pop with a refreshing sense of humour. Unfortunately, their relative inexperience was readily on display at Le National -- no thirty-five-minute set should feel as repetitive as theirs turned out to be. While the band’s songs feel reasonably distinctive from each other on record, their live renditions melded together into a trebly, vaguely irritating mass -- even their cover of Pavement’s “Frontwards” was seamlessly assimilated into the cheery blur. By the time they played their best song, “You! Me! Dancing!”, I found myself imagining a mash-up of every other song they’d played over the course of the evening (all of which were almost identical in arrangement and tempo). This is really too bad, because they had stage presence and charisma in spades, with all seven members contributing shouts, hand claps and even, by the set’s end, synchronized dance moves. They definitely show heaps of promise for a new band, but their songwriting needs work. Let’s hope they have some new tricks up their sleeves for their forthcoming full-length debut. (A specific note, guys: take it easy on the glockenspiel -- it gets awfully grating when you use it for nine tenths of your set.)

Unlike Los Campesinos!, Kevin Drew and his pared-down Broken Social Scene more or less conformed to expectations. While I enjoy Spirit If…, it lacks the spark of the “regular” BSS records, preferring to languish in more blessed-out, mid-paced rock songs that often overstay their welcome. Accordingly, when they surprised just about everyone by opening with Broken Social Scene standout “Ibi Dreams of Pavement” -– apparently not played by the band in over a year –- a level of excitement was reached that would not be matched again over the next two hours of the band’s set. By the end of the song, they had switched up their overwhelmingly dense four-guitar lineup (a mainstay throughout the evening) with a trio of horns for a truly show-stopping ending. The excitement generated from that stellar beginning was more than enough to propel the set’s first half, which was made up mostly of Spirit If…’s better songs, including “Lucky Ones” and “Safety Bricks”, as well as a pair of well-loved, older BSS songs, “Cause=Time” and “Stars and Sons.”

After a promising Brendan Canning-led song from his forthcoming album, there was a palpable dip in energy and excitement for a good chunk of the evening. The set’s last truly exciting moments were both derived from Broken Social Scene: Amy Millan of Stars subbed for Leslie Feist on “7/4 (Shoreline),” with the horn section once again providing a wonderfully cathartic close. This was followed by a particularly tedious near-ending segment, with an overlong take on “Farewell to the Pressure Kids” and two renditions -- one right after the other -- of “Major Label Debut (Fast).” It’s one of my favorite BSS songs, but when you’re nearing the two-hour mark and you have at least two dozen other songs to choose from, it’s a little hard to justify. Indeed, by the time they’d finally wrapped up the second version and its extended, blissed-out coda, many of the balcony-dwellers had already left. The other highlight came from the set’s last song, “It’s All Gonna Break.”

Surely knowing that it was a bit of an obvious choice for a closing number, Canning and Drew mixed it up a bit by performing the song’s first half by themselves, with their guitars harmonizing beautifully. It was a breath of fresh air, given the sheer bombast of most of the set’s arrangements. When the inevitable moment of reunion came, they had some fun with it, drawing out the moment and building anticipation as the other seven players rushed on stage. They paused, with Drew even sharing a few words with his bandmates, before picking the song up where they left off and immediately ratcheting up the energy.

While I enjoyed their set a good deal, I felt as though there was an unmistakable gap between the quality of Drew’s “solo” work and that of the group as a whole (with the exception of the lush single “Safety Bricks”), and I think that sense was palpable in the audience’s reaction. There was a feeling of anticipation after every few Kevin Drew song where we wondered: when would we hear another classic? Which would it be? I think I can safely skip out when they tour in support of Broken Social Scene Presents Brendan Canning and, instead, wait for the undiluted form.

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