Going back to last Saturday, it was an interesting day in the Garden State. In the afternoon, about 7 miles from MS.com HQ was the Whitney Houston "Coming Home" service. The event was shown on all the major networks and 24-hour news networks. We're talking CNN, Fox, MSNBC, ABC, NBC, CBS, Fuse and the internets. MTV, the network that gave Whitney her career, choose to show a Jersey Shore marathon, so you have both sides of Jersey represented.
I bring this up because Kori and Jason of Mates of State did pay tribute to Whitney with a quick rendition of "I Wanna Dance With Somebody". It brought major cheers from the crowd. In fact, every song from Mates of State required applause. Going strong as an indie band and as a family for ten years gets them props as well. Heck, now that Thurston Moore and Kim Gordon split, it's time for Kori and Jason to take up the mantle of music couple longevity.
Jogging my memory, I haven't seen Mates of State as a headlining band for a heck of a long time. I've been seeing them on the festival stage (All-Points West, Popped!) and as an opening act for others (Feist). They are one of few bands I caught before I started this blog in 2005, so it was time to get a full 90-minute set for them.
Why do I keep coming back to them? It's guaranteed good times. They haven't made a poor or average album. Everyone has been a decent to good listen. They are a band whose album depends on the level of poppiness they infused. I would say their latest album, Mountaintops, would be at a 60% level of power pop. Team Boo was their biggest pop album at about 90%. Obviously, a band like Mates of State grow and expand when they get further into their careers. Mountaintops is a clean sounding album, with elements of reckless frovitlity (Total Serendipity, At Least I Have You) alongside beautiful, melodic tunes (Desire, Mistakes). No matter what they do, Kori and Jason's voices either together or separate are just gold.
With that said, their shows are just full on good times where you smile and scream along with the band for the new tunes or the old favorites (Ha Ha, Goods). One lucky fan got to join them on stage. It's like a Maxwell's thing, people jumping on stage to sing with the band.
Area singer-songwriter Sean Bones and his big straw hat joins the Mates on this tour. He encouraged the crowd to make bird calls through his set. It being a late Saturday show, and most people had a few in them, they certainly obliged him for the duration of his set. The man had to play by himself, so he needs all the help he can get. Even though his backing band was a drum machine, he was entertaining enough with his quasi-folk filtered through a warped sequencer to give him high marks.
As a side note to Mr. Bones, he was in this local band called Sam Champion, who when I started this thing was touted as the next big band to come from NYC by the other local music blogs. When I eventually saw them, I thought they were horrible. They are no more, thus my music snobbery senses were correct early on.
Comments