 They Might Be Giants @ A Taste of Randolph, Chicago, USA A few years ago They Might Be Giants started playing a song in their live sets
called "They Might Be Giants Got Lost" (it appears on their live Severe Tire Damage
album), and I can't think of a better way to describe the concert they gave at the
mini-"Taste of Chicago" "Taste of Randolph" festival recently. I hadn't seen them live
since the days when they were a pretty sizable attraction at the Taste of Chicago
itself (Chicago's biggest summer event), so the change in festival should have given
me an idea of how far afield they are of where they once were. Problematically for
Giants, their diehard fans have grown up and now don't listen to as much music as
they used to, and with nowhere near the intensity of purpose. TMBG is a
quintessential "college band," although I would be curious to see what current
collegiate folk think of the band. Certainly they're not helping their cause by releasing
consistently worse albums with every go-round. (Next step – a kid's album. Don't
look so surprised.) Perhaps the Johns even recognize the state of things as they are.
Perhaps they feel that Barenaked Ladies got, for some reason, what was rightfully
their own. In any event, this show defined AUTOPILOT with song after song of listless
playing, punch-the-clock crowd response gimmickry, and thoroughly forced humor
that made it impossible to pretend that TMBG are not 40-something dinosaurs
themselves now.
As with every TMBG show I've ever seen (I probably saw about ten of 'em
between 1990 and 1995), John Flansburgh was the obvious weak link, rendered even
more obsolete than before now that they have a second guitarist who can actually
play. The lineup nowadays features the Johns backed by three Dans on guitar, bass,
and drums. The loss of the horn section makes every song sound pretty much the
same, and to be honest I really wanted to leave about eight songs into the set, but
stayed solely to have a complete set list to provide for this review, which will be read
by approximately five people other than myself, though I'm not sure I will even reread
it, because why would I want to relive the boredom? The show sucked. There was
quite a bit of profanity, which at least was new, if not really funny, and the songs
they played were generally ones I either did not want to hear, or ones that I did want
to hear but which were so perfunctorily performed as to really sully the memory of
the band in its prime. Further amusement/cringing was to be had by observing the
crowd, which was about 1/4 youngsters who were excited about seeing TMBG (God
bless 'em) and 3/4 people my age and older trying pathetically to recapture some
magic from their high school/college days. You could tell the difference because ONLY
the older kids were pogo-ing in true old-school TMBG fashion. But I'm not saying that's
cool, in fact it was pretty sad. Here were a few hundred people who probably dance all
of 5 minutes a year trying to unleash something trapped down in their impotent,
nerdy corpses by pogo-ing to "Particle Man." No thanks. The only real highlights were
"She's an Angel" (which is always good) and "No One Knows My Plan" (which was a very
refreshing choice for the set). Anyway, I'm bored and pissed even wasting this much
time talking about this crap. Here's your precious set list. Notice how MANY goddamn
songs they played, cripes!
Intro: Gigantor the Space-Age Robot Review by Patrick Magnanimous |