THE RACONTEURS + Dr.Dog @ Metropolis

By Fraser McCallum - F-Train 120 - 09/30/2006

I arrived a few minutes late to Metropolis, admittedly a bit on purpose as I wasn’t rip-roaring excited about the Raconteurs show. Although I enjoyed the single "Steady As She Goes" and their house band style performance at this year's MTV Awards, I wasn’t terribly familiar with their full repertoire. The Jack White four-piece has only one album and I was uncertain if they could fill a full 90-minute concert with cool material. This was a grave underestimation. The Raconteurs absolutely tore the house down and built it back up over the course of their two-hour rock fest, leaving this writer eating both his words and his hat in sheer amazed elation.

The show was opened by Dr. Dog, a chatty five-piece with two different lead singers. They had an interesting Wilco-like sound and the two vocalists brought very different styles to the table. One, the bass player, had a huge belting Joe Cocker-esque bellow of a voice. The other singer, the rhythm player, wore a ridiculous Bob Dylan scarecrow hat. The hat must have had some magic left in it as he sang Dylan-style too, with a raspy croon. The band as a whole emulated folksy, scruffy beard rock very well, rolling from great slouching rhythms to jazzed up, solo-filled jam songs. They had a great rapport with the crowd and set the night up perfectly for the main event.

Jack White tends to carry a certain status and persona with him in all interviews and live events. He took to the stage the last of the four members of The Raconteurs to thunderous applause and introduced the others. Like a prancing circus master, he introduced the band and finally himself saying, “…and I’ll be Jack White if you want me to be”. White clearly had the audience in the palm of his Fender-riffing hand, and this would last the length of the show. The Raconteurs are made up of White, friend and bluesy solo artist Brendan Benson, and the rhythm section of The Greenhornes Jack Lawrence and Patrick Keeler. They opened the show with an unknown song to me, a latter track from their debut album. From there they jumped into the latest single, a call-response rocker "On The Level" that featured both White and Benson prominently and rose to a climactic solo from the former. The band had a well-balanced sound, and drummer Keller was a nice surprise, dropping heavy fills and rolls where a lazier drummer would have overindulged in cymbal use. He was well featured during a two-minute drum break during the clunking psychedelic blues number “Store Bought Bones” that featured White using a haunting, distorted megaphone at the back of the stage. This song really got the crowd going, chanting “ya can’t buy whacha can’t find whatcha kind find” as White rocked out on slide guitar. From there Benson took over with a slow, warm acoustic ballad. Basically this was the pattern for the whole set. White would do an insane rock number filled with screaming guitar solos then Benson would respond with a slow bluesy ballad. However, some songs like "Hands" and "Level" -- truly the highlight of the night -- were excellent in the hybrid vocal efforts of both rockers.

In the last third of the show, The Raconteurs explored new ground, a new tune about Nashville escapades, but also two interesting covers. The first was an old Bowie cover "It Ain’t Easy" from Ziggy Stardust fame that featured Benson predominately exploring his vocal range. This song was fantastic and took this writer a minute or two to realize it was a cover as it was being expanded into brave new territory. The second cover, Jack’s turn, was a haunting rendition of Nancy Sinatra's "Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down)". White really shone on this tune with effects-driven tremolo guitar stabs on each ‘Bang! Bang!”. This dragged out a little long into a messy jam but was a cool take on a great song from left field. With that the ‘Tellers (Raconteurs is French, what?) left the stage to grab a drink or two.

The Metropolis audience did their usual floor pound, except this time it seemed incredibly sincere and impassioned, much more than usual. Perhaps it was because of the surprising French dominance of the crowd; regardless the house demanded more and of course they got it. White led his troops back out and immediately jumped into the much anticipated hit single "Steady As She Goes". Although this is probably their least interesting recorded song, it was a solid live tune, especially the huge tom explosions and solid floor-boot action from Keeler. This jumped into another new unknown song that featured a fifth member on organ and Benson and White wailing John ’n Paul-style on one mic. After howling applause, the show ended with a slower Benson blues number that slowly escalated into the Jack White show. Like every modern action movie, this tune had the audience thinking the show was done 4-5 times before it came to an ear-splitting finish. It was in this encore where White really stole the show and outperformed Benson, ratcheting wildman solos and psychedelic stop-start explosions to new levels. For the last show of their tour, The Raconteurs did not disappoint, ending with huge rock-out finish and group bow.

All in all, a great show for an interesting new band that may or may not survive, but has the collective talent and showmanship to hold any uptight Montreal crowd at their mercy. Going in with few expectations can be a great surprise with talent like this. 8.5/10

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