A review of vintage take on modern music, and terrible phone quality photos
In spite of the ever increasing cost of living, I’m thankful to live and work in the SF Bay Area due to the fact that so many cool people come here to have awesome events.
One of these events that is very near the top of that list, and definitely the top of the list for, at the very least, this latter half of 2014 at least is the Scott Bradlee & Postmodern Jukebox Eviction Tour, and I was absolutely stoked to be there on hand for their San Francisco stop (@ Slim’s), ready to listen to their awesome covers of mostly modern pop music in a truly inspired vintage style. If you haven’t heard of them yet, I highly recommend you hop over to Scott’s YouTube channel and get ready to get hooked, because that channel is made of magic and amazingness.
On to the show itself. In a nutshell, it was everything I wanted in a live show:
- The show was true enough to the original material that I never thought “What the heck are they doing?”
- Yet enough added material that made attending in person worthwhile.
- Fantastic style, great looking cuts on the handsome men and the ladies
- A stylish and engaging MC to boot
- Audience participation encouraged at the right times
- A nice bit of storyline and great sense of immersion
- Pointed recognition of the often forgotten instrumentalists (Adam Kubota on Bass, Chip Thomas on Drums for the west coast tour portion, and I could not hear the names of the sax player or trombones, if someone wants to chime in I’ll amend this)
- And not in the least, a phenomenal opening act.
That opening act was Kate Davis, a brilliant bass player with a gentle, otherworldly voice. Possessed of fast, precisely placed fingers, and a keen insight of how to work a crowd by musical choice and personality, she won over the crowd in less than a song and thirty seconds, and she continued to win, harder and faster to the point that I almost didn’t want her to leave. Which she didn’t so yay! Really good job with sharing her original songs with us. I’m definitely going to be following her work in the future.
The killer finisher was her cover of Blister in the Sun. I’m not sure why it is on some other guy’s soundcloud, so if you’re reading this Kate, if you want me to take it down, I definitely will!
I will take this point to apologize for phone quality pictures not exactly close to the stage as well.
The host, Drue Davis, was charming, humorous and full of energy. Absolutely clever and straddling the line between the style of an old school radio emcee with the passion of a preacher.
Scott Bradlee was in evidence of course, off to the left, clearly in front, yet glad to stay to the side for most of the show until the final frames when he had the stage to himself, but more on that later.
A first look at Robyn Adele Anderson who I believe opened with Wiggle. (Much as I wanted to, I did not take down the set list in spite of my best efforts, I was so caught up in it. But I’ll share what I did remember later.)
Robyn was as vivacious and charismatic as she is in the PMJ videos, but even larger than life than even I had anticipated. (I’m a huge fan of her style).
Seeing her up close and personal was … just amazing.
Kate Davis made a reappearance to deliver her crowd pleasing take on All About That Bass. Which I will go on record to say I love approximately 500 times more than the original.
Ariana Savalas, best known for her scorching version of No Diggity burned the house down with her seductiveness. Hot damn.
I also had no idea whistling could be so sexy. Revelations. Damn.
(She also took over for many of the songs that Christina Gatti is recognized for vocals on Scott’s channel).
Alex Macdonald deserves special mention, an amazingly talented tap dancer, I believe he burned approximately 70,000,000 calories throughout the night.
And Ashley Stroud. Wow.
Yeah, I’m going to give her two pictures because I can. What a triple threat, singing, sassing, and tapping in tandem with Alex.
Robyn again, after a costume change. Amazing talent, great expressiveness, and funny to boot in the lead up to the PMJ version of Thrift Shop.
All three of the ladies on stage at once. Can you say demolition squad?
As fast as I tried, I couldn’t get the bow out, but I did get this shot.
So, that’s it for pictures. Other items to note?
The whole thing was done as though we were watching old school radio taking place, complete with great takes on advertising, with mocking of mobile phones, Four Loko, among other modern products.
Intermission featured Betty Boop cartoons without sound, which was an interesting choice.
Sadly some of the artists I had hoped to see, notably Christina Gatti and Von Smith were not on this portion of the tour.
The crowd was great, all raptly attentive and friendly with one another at least within my range of vision.
Other songs that were played that I did not mention include:
Note that this is an incomplete list.
If there was one thing I would have changed, it would be for the space to have had chairs. My back was killing me by the end of the night.
I can’t wait for them to come back to SF, and I hope they get an even bigger venue next time! (With chairs)