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indie-snob>+!#
zwan @ the metro (1.25.03)
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The frigid, Chicago air put a damper on my spirits as the highly unorganized Metro made me wait an hour after doors were supposed to open in the freezing cold waiting to retrieve my will call tickets for Zwan. Upon entering, I took a spot in the back of the venue with my friend, Helene. We waited, chatted a bit, and the opening band came on. South of Houston (HOUSE-ton), a most obvious reference to NYC's SoHo, was more ridden with teen-angst than the latest Papa Roach release. The all-male trio is obviously just a group of feminists with lines like "I fucking hate you / I want to rape you." What they played made me sick to my stomach, and I was amazed that this band from Los Angeles should be recognized by such prestige as Billy Corgan, Mark Sweeny and Jimmy Chaimberlain. I was grateful that the set was only 20 minutes and not more. That, however, left a 2-hour set for the-more-epic Smashing Pumpkins, emerging as a group known as Zwan. Opening with a melodic piece of instrumental guitars (three, actually), bass and drums, the band carved out a nice little niche for themselves for the night. Corgan was smiling the entire time, as was the rest of the band. Choosing a set-list out of the 3-dozen songs debuted on the road must have been difficult, but obviously not impossible. Their single, "Honestly," went over well with the crowd, but was certainly not one of the band's finest points of the evening. "For Your Love" and "One of These Days" did it especially for me, with melodic vocals and punching guitars along with bass lines that were genuinely great. But with more Corgan-led guitar solos than you could shake a fist at (along with references to Jesus and God by the dozen), the night's perfermance began to drone on after the 1-hour mark. Endings quite frankly, never did seem to end. They'd stop, wait momentarily for applause, and start up again with the bridge leading into yet another chorus. I'd say they did this with two-thirds of the songs. The other third was filled with other alternate instrumental endings. Two encores became torturous, even though the music was absolutely amazing, and the show already topped one of the best concerts I've seen musically. I guess I stayed through it all with the hope I'd hear some Pumpkins songs as an encore, maybe "Disarm" or "Bullet With Butterfly Wings." Hell, at that point, I'd even take "Ava Adore," but they never came. Even though I went hoping to see the Smashing Pumpkins show I never did get to, I left knowing that Zwan was one of the best groups of musicians on the face of this earth, but not yet ready for Arena Rock. But afterall, Zwan is what he always wanted the Pumpkins to be, but never did get around to change their sound that direction. But in two years, Zwan will be playing at your local massive arena, tickets upwards of $200, and I'll be happy that I saw them for $25 before the general public knew there was a Zwan. And though this was my second Zwan show, they gained an elegance that wasn't present in the first and a spin-off fanbase that could only be beaten by a spin-off Radiohead. |