The Modern Age

Look! It’s the Kaiser Chiefs cornered in a nook at the offices of SPIN.

Tonight, for a special SPINhouse session, the boys from Leeds did a rousing, stripped down set for a packed and liquored-up crowd, doing about 5 (? or was it 6?) songs before heading off to do their headlining concert at Maxwell’s in New Jersey. Tunes included “Oh My God”, “Everyday I Love You Less and Less”, “Na Na Na Na Naa”, and “I Predict a Riot”.

Although I saw them at the Tribeca Grand a couple months ago and was not really bowled over by their performance (despite they had great energy), this time I was much more taken with them. Probably because the songs were slower and I could actually hear the music. “Everyday I Love You Less and Less” actually sounds better a bit slower and with less “rock” to the sound. It actually sounds…pretty instead of an anthem for hyperactive adolescents.

All in all, totally positive musical experience. Although I still probably like the Futureheads much more, the Kaiser Chiefs aren’t half bad–and their mid-song banter, absolutely hilarious!

During a dull moment, when technical difficulties were taking hold on the sound system, singer Ricky Wilson panned the crowd to find someone to tell a joke. When the girl in front of him had no funny ha-has to tell of, he hoisted his mike stand up in the air so a girl on the mezzanine could tell her laugher, which started off as, “The Pope is in a car…”

But before she could finish her sentence, Ricky paused and told the crowd on the main floor what the girl looked like who was telling the joke (brown hair, tall, big top on, wearing a bit of lipstick…) in order to “set the stage.” However the tech bug was fixed before the girl could even finish the joke, although Ricky said, “Pope in a car…heard that one” and insisted that people shouldn’t be telling jokes about the Pope since he’s “quite ill” and to make fun of Michael Jackson instead.