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Dismemberment
Plan, El Guapo, The Man As the farewell tour of the Dismemberment Plan (Desoto Recordings), the Cradle was packed with all types from virgin observers to veteran well-wishers. As the club swelled with people from the unusually long line at the entrance, the Man from Chapel Hill quickly took the stage. As the guitarist, bassist and drummer began banging away, the lead singer jumped on the stage. From a distance you did not know what to make of this specter at the mic. With no shirt, longish-hair and about 1% body-fat - looking like a heroin addict without the heroin - he fit the mold of the renaissance garage rock singer to the T. This is the point where I realized that this ghost was the one of the guys that worked the door at the Cradle - the guy that looks about one step away from death. The Man went through about five songs of garage rock with flair and competence though not exactly ingenuity. As the Plan would later mention, the Man is probably the skinniest and tallest band around - word. Next up was El Guapo (Dischord Records). Taking their time setting up an onslaught of electronics - synths and generally noisemakers - most of the crowd watched expectantly. As the three piece started off with their variation of art-rock some of the crowd dropped while others watched the oddities. The initial head man playing a variety of instruments - guitar, synths - started off the monotone singing display, while the keyboardist got into his own world and the drummer looked like he couldn't play hard enough and also that he might murder everyone in the crowd. Seriously, the drummer had so much intensity it was scary, causing him to slightly miss a beat and the like as he switched from traditional drumming to stand-up pounding to bass to singing to a noisemaker. Most of the songs had a dull overly-arty feel to them; and though a number of interesting segments were interspersed they were often not brought to complete fruition. For the final song, El Guapo whipped out this amazing dance-party track that finally brought smiles across everyone's face.
Though the Plan set up their gear pretty quickly they took somewhat
of a rock star time to actually take the stage. When they finally
did, the audience's cheers were deafening. Lead singer Travis
Morrison - who visually could be the Morrissey of indie-rock in
terms of atheistic appeal amongst the ladies - swiftly grabbed
the mic and let rip into their first three songs. All four members
of the Plan are so well accomplished musicians and were so collective
tight it was amazing. As I would later surmise, Morrison was best
at being showman when just up there with his little keyboard,
thus allowing him to do very interpretative singing with his arms.
After the first three songs, the crowd was informed the rest of
the show would be by request - how cool is that. While, the Plan
declined several songs from their earliest material - which they
contended they failed to exactly know - they indulged the crowd
in every other context. This allowed the Plan to play a plethora
of songs spanning most of their career. It also allowed some people
to whine somewhat privately that they should have picked them
to request a song because they were "real" fans. Now
topped with a Panama Jack hat from a hefty gentleman in the crowd
- as joke, then to diminish the heat from the stage lights - Morrison
went through the catalog sometimes with guitar and sometimes with
just standing keyboard, while guitarist Jason Caddell and bassist
Eric Axelson traded off going to a heavily-endowed synth and drummer
Joe Easley tried not to pass out from the pace. At one point,
Morrison took someone's cell phone and sang with the phone next
to them into the mic, while saying hello and talking to the girl
during bridges. Since the Plan played so many songs, including
three as an encore, I might as well just list the albums, yet
some of the highlights included "The Dismemberment Plan Gets
Rich," "Anniversary," "Ice of Boston,"
"Bra," "Ellen and Ben," "You Are Invited"
and "Spider In the Snow" to name a few. This was a remarkable
show where you could feel the love of the audience and the love
of the Plan for what they were doing. As the lead singer from
the Man said, hopefully the Dismemberment Plan will be like Kiss
and do like ten farewell tours.
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