Put A Little Mustard On That Mustard

Electric Six @ Bowery Ballroom 11/16/2007
It’s Showtime! / Dance Commander / Rock n Roll Evacuation / Down At McDonnellzz / Infected Girls / White Train / Electric Demons In Love / Randy’s Hot Tonight! / Dance Pattern / Improper Dancing / Danger! High Voltage / Future Is In The Future / Feed My Fuckin’ Habit / I Buy The Drugs // When I Get To The Green Building / Dance Epidemic / Gay Bar / Germans In Mexico (with a tiny bit of Everything Counts by Depeche Mode)

1. This is probably just an irrational phase, but lately, I think I’m starting to kinda hate people who are openly dismissive of the Electric Six. I know this makes me sound awful and condescending, but when people write them off as a joke band, it makes my blood boil and I just can’t stop myself from assuming that they just aren’t very smart, even though I should know better. I mean, if it’s not your type of thing, fine, but c’mon, is it that hard to recognize quality satire? Is it that hard to realize that music can be ironic and funny and exciting and dead serious at the same time? Quite simply, the Electric Six make music that reflects (and reflects upon) this era of American pop culture more effectively than any other rock and roll band working today. It’s a mess of contradictions; an orgy of depraved excesses and base impulses. The characters in Dick Valentine’s songs are obsessed with sex, but confused by sexuality, and terrified of love and responsibility. They are nihilistic hedonists, and dogmatic narcissists. They live and die by junk. It’s absurd, extreme music for an extremely absurd era.

2. This show wasn’t as insane, rowdy, or unforgettable as their concert on the boat a few months ago, but that’s understandable, since few things can be that transcendentally awesome. The audience was still pretty crazy, and more or less entirely comprised of people who either danced or moshed for the entire duration of the gig.

3. You should see the Electric Six in concert if just to hear Dick Valentine’s banter, which is as ridiculous, funny, and clever as the music itself. My favorite bit from this show was when he was berating his drummer for being a privileged rich asshole from Westchester County in the middle of “Future Is In The Future.” It probably doesn’t sound all that amusing in print, especially since I can’t remember what he was saying well enough to quote it, but believe me, it was great.

Electric Six “It’s Showtime!” – You become an artist because you want to be validated. You want to leave your mark on the world, and to make people come around to appreciating your style and vision, and you want their adulation and approval. And then you get it, and you start to notice that people treat artists like a commodity, or like a service. The way some people act, you begin to wonder if there’s any real qualitative difference in their mind between yourself and a cheeseburger. You begin to resent your audience, but you still want and need their love, so the show must go on. You become more aware of their motivations, and you get cynical: Hey, give ’em what they want! You put on a cape, you give them a little dance, and you embrace everything about you that is a cheeseburger. You’re going to be the best cheeseburger ever! (Click here to buy it from Metropolis Records.)