These Things Get Louder

The New Pornographers @ Terminal 5 6/19/2010

Sing Me Spanish Techno / Up In The Dark / Myriad Harbour / Use It / Crash Years / Jackie Dressed In Cobras / A Bite Out Of My Bed / Adventures In Solitude / Sweet Talk, Sweet Talk / Go Places / All The Old Showstoppers / Jackie / Moves / Your Hands (Together) / Twin Cinema / My Shepherd / The Laws Have Changed / Silver Jenny Dollar / Mass Romantic / The Bleeding Heart Show // Challengers / Electric Version / Slow Descent Into Alcoholism / Testament To Youth In Verse

I’m not even going to get into another rant about how much I loathe Terminal 5. Everything about the venue is horrible, music should never be performed there, fuck Bowery Presents, etc, etc, etc. If you’ve been there you know how bad it is, and if you’ve never been, you should do whatever you can to avoid it.

You should see the New Pornographers, though. Five albums into their career, they are at the point where a 100 minute show comes out sounding like a hit-packed extravaganza even if they skip over “Letter From An Occupant,” “It’s Only Divine Right”, and “My Rights Vs. Yours”. Whereas the other times I have seen the full band in concert – all the regulars plus Dan Bejar, Neko Case, and whatever auxiliary players are on hand to play strings, horns, and whatnot — the shows were a bit stiff and mannered, this one was more relaxed and free-wheeling. Given that they were playing Terminal 5, a lot of the nuances in the arrangements were lost to horrible sound, but when they went for grandeur and oomph on “Moves,” “Myriad Harbour,” and “All The Old Showstoppers,” they pulled it off beautifully. “The Laws Have Changed,” now and forever the band’s greatest song, was another highlight, as was the cheery, Dexy’s Midnight Runners-esque “A Bite Out Of My Bed.”

The New Pornographers “Moves”

I just want to put it out there that I wish I had given Together a slightly better review. At least a few decimal points higher. I still don’t think it’s on par with the first three albums, but it’s pretty great on its own terms, and a number of the songs have grown on me a lot since I last wrote about the record. “Moves”, in particular, has become a favorite, and I’ve really fallen for the way it shifts between moments of bombast and this sort of dazed affect. The latter is what really draws me in — the “slo-o-o-ow do-o-o-own la-a-a-a-die-e-e-es slo-o-o-o-o-o-o-ow do-o-o-o-o-o-o-own” hook is one of Carl Newman’s all-time best and most inventive hooks, not just for its novelty value, but for the way it seems to push the song upward towards the next catchy bit, like an escalator moving between floors.

Buy it from Amazon.