Many bands have politics in their music. Most of those bands lean to the left. And most of those left-leaning bands love to preach their message in between songs when they've got the stage. All of those bands preach -- and preach and preach and preach -- when they come to the nation's capital. Almost.
The Thermals lyrics are almost entirely polarizing socio-political commentary, and some of the cleverest such commentary around, with vivid imagery and, alternately, subtle-but-unmistakable points of argument and flat out slap in the face calls against arms. Thankfully, the band spares us the lulls between songs and lets the music do the talking. Lets the lyrics spread the word.
The band kicked things off with the wake-up call opener from the latest record, "The Body, the Blood, the Machine." Hutch Harris steps forward with guitar and voice, singing "God reached his hand down from the sky/He flooded the land, then he set it afire/He said, 'Fear me again. Know I'm your father/Remember that no one can breathe under water.'" The drums kick in, and starting with the chorus, the band rocks through the rest of "Here's Your Future." It's stick-in-your-head pop punk, and most songs are just as catchy, just as sing along worthy, making for stuck-in-your-head overload. You're not likely to hide from the message in a song like "I Might Need You To Kill," and the opening lyric "Locusts, tornadoes/crosses and Nazi halos/they follow, they follow," pretty much guarantees that. Followed by "An Ear for Baby," the opening of the set was identical to the opening of the new album, but of course, the next song on the album, the MP3 of choice, "Pillar Of Salt," is held for later.
The Thermals attack conservatives, war, religion and society with anxious aggression, and the band's music has evolved past the Guided By Voices feel of the first record. They aren't playing for the radio, but they're not so lo-fi. It's a more professional approach, now. "Power Doesn't Run On Nothing" has some of the finest antiwar wordplay around -- and plenty of bands have been inspired to take up that cause this decade -- with lines like, "We need the land you're standing on/So let's go, move it," "We're more equal/We'll move your people/off the planet/because goddamn it we need the fuel!" and "Our power doesn't run on nothing/it runs on blood/and blood is easy to obtain/when you have no shame/We have no shame!"
But just as deftly, The Thermals drop songs of love, "A Stare Like Yours," which still manages to polarize, and failed love, the heartbreaking "St. Rosa and the Swallows."
Hutch and bassist Kathy Foster have been playing together for a long time, and The Thermals is their music, but the stage belongs to Hutch. He's the frontman, after all, and he's really good at it. Engaging and likable. When he did address the crowd, it was to express a sincere appreciation of the audience's response to the band and to thank them for coming to the Black Cat and making it a sell out. The Thermals -- normally a trio, and just a duo of Hutch and Kathy when they recorded their latest record -- brought a second guitarist with them, allowing Hutch to use his hands and arms for other things at times. And he exhausts them. He sings with his gestures and seems to hug and hold his fans.
The Portland band's got a D.C. connection beyond politics. It recorded the latest album with producer Brendan Canty and engineer Guy Picciotto, both alums of Fugazi and Rites of Spring. "Hold the Sound" was appropriately dedicated to them.
It would have been too predictable to close or encore with "Pillar of Salt," but the crowd response showed why The Thermals made the kids wait 'til late in the set for their favorite song. The energy in the room increased as soon as the song began. A terrific melody and organ-mimicking lead guitar make this song ripe for crossover appeal. But it was Hutch wailing "Returning to the Fold's" "wait for me" over and over that closed the set and left the crowd in the grungy debris of second-wave, '90s alternative rock explosion.
The encore stole highlights from all earlier Thermals, with Hutch instructing us to "Pray for a new state/Pray for assassination" on "God and Country" -- their message often attacks religion and politics at the same time, and god bless America for that -- and closing out with "It's Trivia" -- the first song from the first record.
The Big Sleep was almost as good, a real eye-opening performance. Its noisy yet melodic post-rock was largely instrumental and thoroughly impressive, full of psychedelic distortion, steady beats and cool-groove bass lines. The music is catchy despite being very heavy. Bassist Sonya Balchandani offered two sweet and soft vocal performances. Guitarist Danny Barria's lead vocal turn was much weaker, and maybe that's why they didn't bother to sing much at all. But they didn't need to. The music spoke volume.
Statehood, a local group, was less of a revelation, though musically tight and driven by the best drumming of the evening. It's another band on the post-punk bandwagon. Any band that draws on that source material obviously is listening to great music, but too many bands are grasping at that same sound these days, and it gets old. And the pining-for-airplay vocals bogged it down. The singer's voice is strong but just too over the top. In that regard, Statehood could learn from The Big Sleep.
