Last night a friend and I saw Echo & The Bunnymen at House of Blues in Anaheim. It was not a good experience. I don’t think I’ll be seeing Echo & The Bunnymen again, and whether or not I do, I doubt I’ll be seeing them or anyone else at that particular House of Blues.

Ordinarily, I like the House of Blues. Or, at least, other Houses of Blues. I’ve never had a problem with the one in West Hollywood, and last year, I saw the Psychedelic Furs at the one in Atlantic City with my friends Paul and Joe. But seriously, someone needed to call the fire marshal on this one in Anaheim last night. I’ve frequented many small, packed, sweaty clubs in my life — including the Roxy just last month for Big Audio Dynamite — but this was ludicrous. Two floors of absolutely airless rooms stuffed with throngs of people desperate to move somewhere, anywhere, even an inch. Over the course of the evening, I had accidental intimate relations with five people (four of them men, and none of them appealing). Add to this pressurized tin-can atmosphere the utter lack of air conditioning or oxygen. C’mon, House of Blues, you’re banking boatloads of cash — turn on the AC! A heavyset middle-aged guy sutured onto my right flank started texting his wife:  “Awful time. Really. Too old for this. Sweaty. Packed like sardines. No air.” I started to worry about him and wondered why he didn’t leave — but then realized again that there was no way to get out. During one of the set breaks he and his friend took advantage of a clearing in the crowd and inched their way toward the exit.

That third “set break,” by the way, was not actually a set break — it was an extended interregnum courtesy of the band’s singer, Ian McCulloch. While I have always liked the band’s music, and was eager to see them, especially with a friend in tow who is a major fan, I have to say that the vocal work of this Ian McCulloch presents not even passing similarity to his younger self. It’s not just that he can’t sing any more; he can barely talk. (The five cigarettes that he smoked during his vocals didn’t help, I’m sure.) I’m not sure if the soundman was trying to prove a point, or just curious, but a couple of times he dropped the echo from McCulloch’s voice and the results were alarming:  recall Johnny Cash’s sandblasted deathbed final vocals before his deathbed; compared to Ian McCulloch, Cash sounded like Julie Andrews. McCulloch also can’t be bothered to learn his own lyrics. And, mostly, he can’t be bothered to deliver what he and his band promised:  their first two albums, Crocodiles and Heaven Up Here, performed in their entirety. The band sounded great, especially lead guitarist Will Sergeant, but McCulloch put in a dreary first set, and an even worse second set, accidentally repeating one verse, skipping or mumbling lyrics, and, finally, stopping mid-way through the second album. After a long long long pause, the band came back with McCulloch making some apology that no one could understand, and then he phoned in the two hits they would have played as encores (The Killing Moon and Lips Like Sugar) and left. Bad evening for a good band? I don’t think so. Here’s someone else’s review of the show two nights prior at Club Nokia.  Note the criticism of McCulloch’s “singing.”

When it was over, I was just glad to be out of there. There was a surge of people to get to the door, and you could hear gasps of “Oh my God, AIR!” as people hit the cool evening breeze. One person likened the atmosphere inside to “dollar night at a whorehouse.” My friend wavered between anger and regret. I understand; he loves this band, and I don’t. On the way home, we listened to their first two albums. I think from here on out, that should be the preferred method of experiencing Echo & The Bunnymen.

This entry was posted on Monday, May 23rd, 2011 at 9:54 pm and is filed under Music, Thoughts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.