3/27: Akron/Family @ The New Museum

I have one Akron/Family album, which I listen to on occasion. Aside from that and from seeing their name all over the damn place, I didn’t know shit about this band. Seeing them was proposed by a friend of mine and, being a curious bub about the hubbub, I went with him to the basement of the New Museum on the Bowery to watch the show.

good thing we weren't trying to go to the basement of the alamo

Akron/Family went on first – and quite early – allegedly because the Lexie Mountain Boys were stuck in traffic. We missed most of the first song, whereas a lot of unlucky folks missed the whole thing. The room was a large square with a tiny stage and a few raised levels in the back. There was hardly anyone there despite it being sold out, probably because everyone assumed the show would start much later.

The sound was terrible. There was a horn section on the other side of the room that I could not hear at all. On two separate occasions two members of the band – the guitarist and the drummer – each tried to sing and the mics just weren’t fucking on during the songs. The sound techs kept running up and messing with things on the stage, presumably unplugging important pieces of equipment.

probably not, but maybe

I’ll continue to listen to their album – and will probably get another – but the jury’s still out on the Akron/Family live show. They’re easy to like: the songs are fantastic, they have an Age of Aquarius thing going, they stress community and they are energetic performers. And catering to my personal taste, they are notably inspired by African music and presented numerous drum breaks. But the one problem I have with Akron/Family is that they spend an obnoxious amount of time coercing the crowd to participate, handing tambourines audience members and trying to get people like me to sing along. That is just not something I’m interested in doing.

To end they show, the horn section started playing Auld Lang Syne and lead a conga line through the room, out into the hallway and back into another door. This I thought was fun, but the only time I will ever join a conga line is if I’m behind Shakira. The line ended on the stage with Akron/Family singing the line, “Last year was a hard year for such a long time, this year’s gonna be ours” to the tune of Auld Lang Syne. They finally got the majority of the crowd to join in and walked off the stage, leaving it to the the people in my immediate vicinity. Then four girls with sequined dresses, mirror-bedecked helmets and enormous God’s eyes walked on stage.

photo courtesy of brooklynvegan

It’s hard to explain without audio of the whole sequence, but here’s my brief account anyway: they were all chanting the same line as the crowd, until one of them started sounding obnoxious on purpose, which led to the other three making fun of her. I had read that they were some sort of comedy troupe, so I figured it was a joke, but nevertheless it did not go over well and left the audience generally confused. They segued directly into a vocal jam along the lines of YEM which I swear to Christ lasted for ten to fifteen minutes. I wish I had timed it, but frankly I was dazed and it didn’t cross my mind. It’s also important to note that, because of the segue from Akron/Family into this, everyone was transfixed and unable to leave. There was a lot of hootin’ and hollerin’ until they picked up their God’s eyes and walked off stage still doing the same thing. There is a time and a place for things like that, and despite the best efforts of both bands and the chumps at the New Museum, that was not it.

Akron/Family will continue to make a name for themselves, and the summer festivals they have lined up certainly won’t hurt. I don’t know if I’d see them again on their own, but they can do much towards adding to the attractiveness of a long list of acts. As for Lexie Mountain Boys, please stop doing that.

Next up: Writing about seeing Still Flyin’ with college kids at stupid Union Hall, but I probably won’t get to that until after I see Margot & the Nuclear So and So’s splitting a bill with Cloud Cult tomorrow the 9th at Music Hall of Williamsburg.