beach house at mfnw

Beach House played at Berbati’s – a dark, unwelcoming bar with erratic acoustics (to put it charitably).

Beach House – Some Things Last A Long Time

They basically sounded exactly like their recordings, although a few songs (I recognized “Wedding Bells”) were faster than the album versions.  They played new material that was a little more upbeat than their first two albums – shorter songs, a little faster ,vocals a little higher in the mix and less ethereal.

The new material fit in nicely with the songs from Devotion and their self-titled album.  Beach House’s repertoire is a fairly consistent, cohesive one, and the new songs seem to suggest that their album next year won’t be too much of a departure from the first two.

I find it hard to see the appeal in standing still for an hour in a hot room full of hipsters twittering about how “beautiful” the music is and how “Beach House made them believe in true love again”.  Beach House really did sound great, but I’m not sure the live experience is one I’ll seek out again, since THEY SOUND THE SAME ON MY STEREO.  I talked to Alex Scally when he was working at the merch table before the show and he assured me that they would be try very hard to make the show “sexy”.

I guess it’s hard to deny that Victoria Legrand has a sexy voice, and there’s something undeniably sensual about Beach House.  If you want to see a couple of sexy robots playing with organs on a stage, by all means, make a point of seeing Beach House on this tour – they sound more polished this time than on any of the other occasions I’ve seen them (possibly the result of Berbati’s stellar sound crew.  I’ve never been impressed by the venue before, but they did a really fantastic job the entire night, judging from the Brunettes set earlier in the evening). These folks have been on the road for a long time, and it shows – they know their equipment, and they know how to sound good.

(Sorry guys, no pictures this time – Beach House fans are NOT VERY ACCOMODATING.)