A Joyful Noise

Last week I saw Welsh alt-rock (not to be confused with burgeoning DJ scene ctrl-rock) band The Joy Formidable at the Loft in Lansing. I generally stay away from the Loft because it's a fairly sterile environment, the sound is often muddy, and in general they book D-list touring bands with tight pants and/ or tribute shows, but some friends talked me into making my way with them to this downtown locale and I found myself walking by the thrillingly named Thomas M. Cooley Law School stadium (home of the excuse-to-drink-in-public Lansing Lugnuts baseball team) on a rainy April evening with glass half-empty expectations. I'd heard the Joy Formidable on the radio a bit and didn't mind them - in many ways they sounded as if Lush had dispelled with their dated early 90s production work and added some muscle to the proceedings - but wasn't overly familiar with their material. I was in for a pleasant surprise in the end.

And I wasn't the only one!

I showed up during the second support band, a "hey, we're from Los Angeles" band from Los Angeles called Kitten. They covered Prince and then played lots of songs that sounded like Prince while their impish punk princess singer flailed on and off the stage, but then closed their set with a high energy garagey thrasher, so, in short, I have no idea if I would like their record. Anyway, next. I knew TJM (as the kids like to abbreve it) had a following but I was surprised at the number of enthusiastic slightly-younger-than-me college aged kids there were at the show, and everyone seemed so happy. The band came out and immediately started rocking out - and they wailed. This band was good enough that I just used one of the most cliched sentences I possibly could to review them, but they had the whole "tight rock band thing" down, with a very full sound proving once again that the power trio is damn near unbeatable when pulled off. But the crowd made me even more excited - these were those damned aloof Millenials, and they were sweating, shouting, and dancing (with even a bit of crowd surfing) like it was 1991 to a certified rock band. In this light even the Loft seemed like a cool place to see a show.

And with this show coming up soon I don't think I have a choice.

I walked out of the humid room at the end of the night to Michigan Avenue where the rain had let up and a bunch of kids were lined up outside of the band's tour bus. Maybe this modern world isn't so bad after all.