SHOW REVIEW: The Girlz Garage Tour
All Girl Summer Fun Band / Lennon / The Start / Lillix / Brassy
Meow Meow - November 11, 2003 (Portland, Oregon)
By: Mark A. Lawrence the IV
The Girlz Garage tour highlights some of the most dynamic female/female fronted acts in the music scenes today. Though I think most of the people were there to see Lillix, It was really The Start that stole the show. The night opened with a pop infectious set for the local All Girls Summer Fun Band, which set up a great hopping energy to the night with their sound of indie rock and Saturday morning upbeat vocals.Lennon followed with an acoustic set that brought the energy a little too low to deal with on a Tuesday night especially for the second band, though I do commend her for taking the risk artistically to attempt a sound so drastically altered from her first album. The set of Jazzy numbers displays her vocal rang and a catalog of songs that emphasis their lyrics. I would have loved to see this set on a different night maybe a tour of smaller venues and jazz joints, but on a Tuesday night after a long 8 hours of work I wanted to be jumping around and earning the pain I was going to be felling in the morning when I clocked in.
But never fear, The Start are here. This was the band I was looking forward to the most and they did not disappoint. With the energy of a sexually charged Hurricane the Start attacked the stage throwing off enough electricity to jump-start the dead. This band was all over the stage like a replay of old film footage of the Clash or the Chili Peppers sans the socks. What respect I had for this band from just listening to their EP jumped ten fold seeing them in concert. They weren't worried about an audience that was lacking in energy; instead they brought the party to the people, all the time playing their music with clarity and detail that marks them as professionals. Amiee Echo has not only been blessed with legs of a kangaroo but in my opinion ranks amongst the top front women for her unbridled energy and the confidence and attitude she controls, that demonstrates the purest of power that makes confident women so awesome. The rest of the band were awesome too playing at the top of their game and the keyboard Jamie Miller had was so eighties punk rock cool I was impressed just by that. I look forward to seeing more of this band, and have a feeling they're going to be big.
Next up was the main draw and put aside that these girls made me feel like one of the parents in the back of the room, they put on a pretty good set. It's got to be hard to follow a set like The Starts but they played their pop edges rock with a high level of proficiency and though Louise Burns was having trouble with her headset, she seemed to be getting a kick out of the boys in the front row obviously crushing on the band. Oh to be young again.
Taking anchor was Brassy a band that mixes a hip-hop funk with guitar attack punk. They have a great sound and really tried to finish the night strong but with a mix of a hard night to start with and the diminish of Lillix focused fans left them a hard room, but they did a good job trying to cover for that playing a dance friendly energizing set. It's hard to play anchor but Brassy did a really good job, finishing a good night with the tour strongly.
