Flashback: Art Brut at Triple Rock (09 Nov 2009)

Art Brut 2009 Tour

• Sep 25 Ososphere Strasbourg
• Sep 26 Marsatac Marseille
• Oct 08 Brixton Academy
• Oct 16 Middle East Cambridge, MA
• Oct 17 Maxwells Hoboken, NJ
• Oct 18 Black Cat Washington DC
• Oct 19 Cats Cradle Carrboro, NC
• Oct 20 The Earl Atlanta, GA
• Oct 21 Club Downunder Tallahassee, FL
• Oct 22 The Bottletree Birmingham, AL
• Oct 23 Spanish Moon Baton Rouge, LA
• Oct 24 Walters On Houston, TX
• Oct 25 The Mowhawk Austin, TX
• Oct 27 Club Congress Tucson, AZ
• Oct 28 Casbah San Diego, CA
• Oct 29 Glass House Pomona, CA
• Oct 30 Cafe Du Nord (2 shows) San Francisco, CA
• Nov 01 Holocene Portland, OR
• Nov 02 Neumos Seattle, WA
• Nov 03 The Biltmore Vancouver
• Nov 04 Neurolux Boise, ID
• Nov 05 Urban Lounge Salt Lake City, UT
• Nov 06 Bluebird Denver, CO
• Nov 08 Slowdown Omaha, NE
• Nov 09 Triple Rock Minneapolis, MN
• Nov 10 Lincoln Hall Chicago, IL
• Nov 12 First Unitarian Church Philadelphia, PA
• Nov 13 Brooklyn Bowl Brooklyn, NY
• Nov 14 Ottobar Baltimore, MD
• Nov 15 Bowery Ballroom New York, NY

Oh man, how I love Art Brut. This isn’t really a band, it’s more like a weird art-rock with singer Eddie Argo “singing” or talking over music. Argo writes the best songs, like “Formed a Band”, which tells the secret origin of him forming a band: “Formed a band, we formed a band! Look at us, we formed a band! … And yes, this is my singing voice, it’s not irony, it’s not rock and roll. We’re just talking to the kids.”

So, yeah, the band formed in London in 2005, with their debut Bang Bang Rock & Roll. By 2006, the group signed with Mute Records (EMI), and they really took off from there – appearing in the USA for the first time.

We caught the band at the Triple Rock Social Club in November 2009… and we’ve been in love with the band since.

PS. My all-time favorite Brut song is “My Little Brother”, which a fantastic line, “My little Brother just discovered Rock & Roll. There’s a noise in his head and he’s out of control.”

Original report:

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I arrived late to the Triple Rock, in Minneapolis, so I had already missed some of Surfer Blood. However, I did get the gist of the band, who seems like they are going to be a hot new buzz band – like Vampire Weekend. The highlight of their set was the last song, in which the guitarist brought the solo drum into the audience as everyone on stage went monkeys. (Sort of feels orchestrated to me, like they didn’t really put much effort in trashing their equipment). The audience seems to welcome Blood Surfer, so it’s all good.

Loads of Art Brut fans were in the audience that night. You can tell by all the t-shirt and their eagerness of being in front and center. When the band came on, doing “Formed a Band”, which singer Eddie Argos turns to the audience and
said, “you ought to try it, it’s brilliant!”

Eddie looks like a guy that doesn’t take himself too seriously. He seems to like to drink a lot and talk a lot (but with his thick British accent, it’s not like we could understand half what was said). He seems to swagger on stage a lot, often using his left arm to
illustrate the songs.

There wasn’t enough room on stage for Argos to do his infamous microphone skip, but he did manage to sing half of “DC Comics” by the bar section. Speaking of which, I think it’s cool that Argos is a huge DC fan – since UK comics are usually, you know, 2000 AD/Judge Dredd sort. During the song, Argos spouted out what I hear as “Christian Bale”, “Booster Gold” (if I can remember, I think he was basically a janitor from the future with future tech and a Legionnaires flight ring), and something about “Metropolis”.

As you can see from the setlist, they did a mix of new and old songs. The setlist also doesn’t reflect what was played, for instance, I know “The Passenger” was played well after “DC Comics”. I suppose the setlist was more of a rough guideline than actual instructions…. which actually fits the way Art Brut operate.

The thing about “The Passenger”, from their latest album Art Brut vs Satan, is that it got this great introduction. Eddie explained how he thought the Iggy Pop song was about taking the subway, “Iggy doesn’t seem to me
to be the driving sort.” It wasn’t until later did he discovered that Iggy’s song was about taking heroin in back of a limo with David Bowie.
Too funny.

Oh the other thing, the way Eddie sings, if you can call it singing, is quite interesting. It’s more like rambling, it definitely feels at time like The Fall – only with a lot heavier backing band.

The band left and came back with three encores. I thought I heard Eddie saying, “we don’t normally do this”, which may have been said in an ironic kind of way. I really couldn’t tell; all I know is that the encores were met by the fans’ demands.

PS, They only had T-Shirts and CDs for sale at the merch table. I was hoping to see some of their awesome shoes. It’s £20 online, which is about $40 USD, but totally worth it if you are a massive Art Brut fan. Get those shoes, and also their latest album, Art Brut vs Satan, at the usual online stores.