In and Out: Jukebox The Ghost cover They Might Be Giants

If you had to peg a lineage here you'd say that Jukebox The Ghost are a fun, nerdy band that draw heavily from Ben Folds Five (though less working-class and more liberal arts) and Ben Folds Five was a band that drew on nerd-rock gurus They Might Be Giants. Back in a time called "the 90s," TMBG wrote that the sun was, "a mass of incandescent gas" and Jukebox The Ghost now, in 2008, tour with a song about that same star and the end of the fucking universe. Connections, inspiration, and hyper-literacy: these things bring us to Piano's on New York's Lower East Side, where Jukebox The Ghost decides to rip through They Might Be Giants' master-work, "Birdhouse In Your Soul." And if these are the next piano-based, nerd-rock geniuses, Ben Folds and TMBG passed the car keys right to the kids. Check the video below.


Julebox the Ghost - Birdhouse in Your Soul from PaulBriganti on Vimeo.

Live Review: They Might Be Giants @ The Beacon Theater [2.2.08]

John Flansburgh, exactly one-half of They Might Be Giants, reacts as naturually as possible. Someone near the back of the Beacon Theater screams, "play 'Boat of Car,'" a song that defines the term "deep cut" and is, in all probability, not included in tonight's set-list. Flansburgh hardly notices, passing spare aknowledgement, but suddenly there are multiple people yelling, in unison, "Boat of Car." Flansburgh looks out into the stage lights and decides to address this miniture movement in the audience. His face registers somewhere between flattery and frustration. In all probability, these people would rather hear other songs. "Boat of Car" isn't a particularly good song, but it is particularly obscure. And sometimes obscurity is currency. You either know the song or you don't. These people asking to hear "Boat of Car" don't really want to hear the song. They want everyone to know that they know it. And, they want to see if the band will play it.

They Might Be Giants admit, at one point, that they've never sold out The Beacon Theater before. It's hard to tell if this statement is based on a body of work ("We've played here 10 times and never sold out") or if it's based on a first-timer's impression ("We mostly play The Bowery and, frankly, it's amazing we packed something on 74th and Broadway"). Either way, the 2,850 members of the audience seem equally impressed with themselves and the band. It feels good to be there the first time something happens.

The crowd, despite totaling somewhere close to 3,000, would appear in the S-section of the dictionary under "subdued." People are standing up but are, as is the case at The Beacon, confined to their rows. On some classic TMBG songs and upbeat new tracks, the crowd bobs around and sings the lyrics. Otherwise, this is the micro-brew and latte set. They came here to see the show, not be a part of it. Entertainment comes in a million different shades but this is not the interactive one. If They Might Be Giants expect to be elevated by the crowd, they are going to be sorely disappointed. Luckily, the stage show is backed by a vicious light-show, rockets of confetti, and, at one point, a dizzying disco-ball effect that makes the room pitch and yawn. A hard-working rock-crowd isn't really necessary for all this to be impressive.

In many ways, this accounts for where They Might Be Giants stand as a movement. No longer are they the architypical nerdy, downtown rock band. No longer do hyper-literate, vaguely post-modern kids come to stand near the stage and pogo up and down to the kind of anthems that are either fatally ironic or deadly serious. They Might Be Giants still play those songs, but those kids are adults now. And standing near the stage means having a front row seat. And having rows and seats means we are nowhere near the slightly edgy scene that this band lived, loved, and, ultimately, transcended.

Which brings us back to "Boat of Car," a song written long before They Might Be Giants ever sold-out The Beacon Theater on 74th and Broadway. And it brings us back to John Flansburgh, looking into the stage lights, towards the back of the orchestra section to find, blindly, where this "Boat of Car" chant is coming from. He thinks. And reacts naturally. "You see," he says, "this whole computerized light show is already in place. We ... we can't really get off the script here." People laugh and it is funny. But he's actually not kidding. The light show is fantastic, even a little propulsive at key moments. But it is totally computerized. The show might only have room for the obscurity already in the script. This quirky band might only have space in the set for pre-planned quirkiness. When you open your doors to 3,000, sometimes there isn't room for everything. Sometimes you just won't play "Boat of Car."

[Photos by Chris Owyoung courtesy of Prefix. Full gallery can be seen here.]