Home > Austin Music Source > Archives > 2008 > August > 25 > Entry
Review: My Morning Jacket at Stubb’s
It was obvious the Olympics were over, what with the sea of sweaty bodies at full swell for the crazy-early start time of My Morning Jacket’s sold-out Sunday show at Stubb’s. Still, the Olympic spirit was in the air, as MMJ made like Usain Bolt and gave back to the people who helped elevate them to idol status. That explains the Capital Area Food Bank on-hand to solicit goods, a gesture afforded them in return for Austin’s embrace of the prog-rock five-piece via multiple SXSW and ACL appearances.
Come 8 p.m., frontman Jim James had already worked himself into a lather, wearing a Dracula cape and doing his best Lenny Kravitz impersonation on the electro-soul title track from the band’s random but pleasing new album, “Evil Urges.” James reckoned Austin the place “where all life started and all life will end,” in one of few asides during a two-hour, workmanlike set.
Dudes in the crowd lip-synched along to the gleeful “What A Wonderful Man,” from the breakthrough album “Z.” Dates gave each other a knowing look during the back-to-back run of pedal-steel, singer-songwriter fare that was “Golden,” from “It Still Moves,” and “Librarian,” from the new one. And private dancers came out of hiding during the roughly 15-minute jam that started with the brooding “Dondante,” segued into the clubby “Touch Me I’m Going to Scream Pt. 2,” and then reverted back to “Dondante,” before James’s Theremin work erupted a ballistic climax of strobe lights, hair-flying head-bangs, and handclaps.
The first song of the encore was “Wordless Chorus,” wherein James sang, “We are … the innovators/They are … the imitators.” By then the point had already been driven home. But the on-deck number was “Highly Suspicious,” a goofy, heavy-metal romp that’s apparently polarized diehards, so MMJ must have felt it needed reiterating.
Comments
Click here to report comment abuse.