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| Photo by Ailecia Ruscin |
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Upon my return to living in Kansas City, Missouri, I was graced with the opportunity to attend two great live concerts, one in Lawrence, Kansas (at The Granada) and one at the old Uptown Theatre in Kansas City’s midtown. In Lawrence I saw Kimya Dawson, a singer-songwriter who is known by many for having begun with band The Moldy Peaches, and now known by many more for her songs’ inclusion in the sound track to the recent popular PG-13 film, “Juno,” a love story about a pregnant teen.
Admittedly, when I first heard The Moldy Peaches, I was sort of turned off by Dawson’s shakey vocals in songs that seemed a bit whiney, blaming pretty girls and all that kind of stuff. But the more I was exposed to her solo work, the more taken I was by her lyrical talent, realizing her ability to capture complex emotions and human experiences in song. She is not appealing for having high-quality, smooth vocals or complicated guitar riffs. Instead, she is appealing for being honest in her music, and poetic, and for speaking up and out against the many wrongs of our society and our world.
At her concert, likely due to the popularity of “Juno,” her audience consisted of almost as many children as grown-ups. And for us she played a good, long set filled with songs of all types. Though she kept her eye mostly to the ground and performed while seated, she was not afraid to speak honestly about her own life or her views on the world and on Bush politics. Throughout her show, while keeping true to herself, her message seemed to be one of hope and positivity, even during songs with lyrics indicating depression with no end in sight. In this, she was an awesome role-model for all of us, and the whole theatre seemed to hold on to her every word and every chord. Despite expectations, she did not perform many of her more-well-known songs and instead mixed up the set with several new songs from a forthcoming children’s album. She is, after all, a new mother who talked of balancing motherhood with touring and song writing. To this, the crowd cheered and begged for her to bring her daughter, Panda, onto the stage. But Dawson did not give in. She chucked and retorted, “Panda is not your circus monkey.”
She is witty and obviously intelligent, insightful, and shy. And in putting herself out there for us and for thinkers, liberals, and children, she is a fascinating and uplifting role-model.
A couple weeks after that show, I connected with an old high-school friend I’d not seen for ten years. After a long night of wine-drinking and getting caught up with her, I received an invitation to The Swell Season at the Uptown Theatre, where said friend occasionally bartends. The Swell Season is the band comprised of the lead male and female of the recently popular Irish indie-film, “Once.” Though I’d not yet seen the movie when I received the invitation, my mother had given me the soundtrack and I was hooked on many of the songs. Like Kimya Dawson, Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova create songs that rely on themselves more than on production. But contrary to Dawson’s style, Hansan is actually a quite strong vocalist (and Irglova is sort of child-like, vocally, a bit like Warhol’s Nico), able to meet a range of notes from deep to high, at times yelling in a Chris Cornell-like melodicism that always manages to remain on key.
That afternoon before the show, I hurriedly rented “Once” from OnDemand and learned the characters behind the songs. My friend who invited me to the concert had caused even greater intrigue by telling me that the couple not only fell in love in the movie, but also in real life. And now they’re on a world tour, performing to sold-out audiences.
During the show, in reverse of the characters they portrayed in the movie, Hansard was a loud-mouth and talked incessantly, whereas his Czech counterpart Irglova remained mostly silent between songs. Hansard’s tales were amusing, though, and he became even more attractive in the telling of them. He was at times cocky, and at times vulnerable in his speech, and discussed at length the strange sensation of going from street-musician to world-famous phenomenon almost overnight. “Everything I’ve been for 20 years has ended and now I’m a successful guy,” he described.
When he wasn’t talking, I was receiving goose-bumps while they performed. It sounded much like the recording or like watching the movie, but being live, and being funneled through the Uptown’s obviously superior sound system, they transcended their own best efforts. Irglova’s high-pitched vocals and piano harmonize with Hansard’s more powerful tones and deeper guitar chords. While I don’t love each song equally and find some a little too slow or too poppy for my overall tastes, the show as a whole was definitely great.
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