Live Review: Unlimited Sunshine Tour with Cake and others
SACRAMENTO, Calif.-- If the acts on Friday night’s (8/9) Unlimited Sunshine Tour bill at Sacramento’s Memorial Auditorium have anything in common, it’s that they don’t fit neatly into any format.
SACRAMENTO, Calif.-- If the acts on Friday night’s (8/9) Unlimited Sunshine Tour bill at Sacramento’s Memorial Auditorium have anything in common, it’s that they don’t fit neatly into any format.
The punks have Warped, the rockers have Ozzfest, and just about every radio station has a festival show that reflects the narrow, focus-group-tested sounds that it broadcasts. So in the current environment, Cake frontman John McCrea deserves credit for assembling a package tour that’s more adventurous.
Whether or not the public is interested in his creation is another question. The 3,800-capacity Memorial Auditorium appeared to be only half full on Friday, despite the presence of hometown favorites Cake at the top of the bill. The fans that did turn out were treated to an evening where music--not demographics and corporate tie-ins--came first.
Mexico’s Kinky opened the night with its energetic blend of Latin-flavored techno-rock as the crowd slowly filed into the hall. After a short break--during which a video screen showed a looped film of ocean waves--Issaquah, Washington’s Modest Mouse took the stage. The critically acclaimed band played a subdued and mostly uninspired set, and its moody grunge failed to engage the unconverted in the audience.
The Hackensaw Boys, looking as if they’d just time-traveled to Sacramento from the 1940s, then occupied a corner of the stage to play a short set of tight and fast acoustic bluegrass while the rest of the stage was set for hip-hop mainstays De La Soul.
De La Soul’s Posdnuos, Trugoy and Mase kept prodding the crowd--overwhelmingly white and twenty-something--until virtually everyone was waving their arms in the air like they just didn’t care.
Though every other band on the bill opted for few stage frills, The Flaming Lips don’t work that way. Frontman Wayne Coyne negotiated a crowded set-up that included giant disco balls, fake snow, balloons and grown men in animal costumes (who also happened to be his bandmates). A video screen flashed sometimes-disturbing images (ranging from a Japanese-schoolgirl shootout to the Teletubbies) as the band played its off-kilter-but-melodic symphonic rock.
Most of The Flaming Lips’ set was drawn from its last two albums--the recently released “Yoshimi vs. the Pink Robots” and 1999’s “The Soft Bulletin.” The group also performed its lone Top-40 hit, “She Don’t Use Jelly,” as well as a cover of Kylie Minogue’s “Can’t Get You Out of My Head.”
The Hackensaw Boys returned for a few more songs as the stage was set for Cake, clearly the band that most in the crowd had come to see.
Opening the set with “Sheep Go to Heaven,” from their 1998 album “Prolonging the Magic,” McCrea and Cake seemed to be leading the crowd in a mostly unprompted sing-along. Though the venues have grown, McCrea--who was wearing a baseball cap and large, Unabomber-style sunglasses--is somehow still able to work a crowd as if he’s in an intimate club.
The band played its hits “Never There” and “Short Skirt/Long Jacket” back-to back--a ploy that backfired because the songs have similar structures. Other than that, the set was tight and nicely paced.
Toward the end of Cake’s performance, McCrea complimented the crowd on its attention span. But time flew during this five-and-a-half hour show--a credit to the individuality, diversity and artistry of the acts on the bill.
Next entry: Rolling Stones best-of set to include four new songs
Previous entry: Street Date Aug. 13: James Taylor, Snoop Dogg