So I have been complaining about going to too many reunion shows, but then, Versus never was exactly broken up, so it’s ok that I went, right? They really are probably my all-time favorite band (the only other contender is Sonic Youth); I saw them play a lot of times back in the late ’90s and beginning of the ’00s; I have basically everything they’ve ever recorded and know the bulk of their lyrics by heart. Versus have played some occasional gigs in the time since they went on hiatus, including at least once or twice here in DC (Teenbeat anniversaries, for example), but I haven’t been able to go to any of them. Now, though, it seems like they are really “together,” playing a fair amount, recording a new album (!).

I wasn’t sure what to expect from this show, though. I checked out a few recent performances on youtube and they left me uncertain and even a little nervous. The line-up has shifted a bit, as they now feature Richard and Fontaine with Ed on drums and a woman named Margaret on violin. It was a little strange, but I found that I could accept this line-up as Versus once I started watching them play live. It helped that the two frontpersons of the band seemed loose and comfortable, chatting and joking around with the audience. It was like, oh yeah, this is Versus alright.

I ended up totally enjoying it (also, it was the first night I went out after getting swine flu, and I had a couple of beers and seemed to be healthy). They played a fair amount of new stuff and mostly earlier old material. It sounded good. The violin (and occasional keyboard) fit in better than I feared. Off the top of my head, I wouldn’t have remembered that Versus ever had any songs in the past with strings, but they played “Deep Red” and it sounded a lot better live than the old EP version, it actually was quite pretty. Versus were always pretty good at pulling off pretty songs amidst the harder indie rock. They did some other old songs like “Be-9,” “Circle,” and “Crazy” (by request). When somebody shouted out for “Morning Glory,” Fontaine commented that, since Ed didn’t play on those later records, he didn’t know them, but then they went ahead and did a pretty decent version of it for the encore.

I couldn’t entirely make up my mind about the new line-up and the new material… it will take me a while to decide what I think. It was totally good, but I kind of missed the latter-era line-up with Patrick and James. Richard is a brilliant guitarist but I think having James on guitar added a lot of depth… I have clear memories of the first time I saw Versus (this was the 3-brother line-up) and watching James play the lead riff on “Glitter of Love.” On the other hand it was interesting to hear how the violin integrated with the band; also the last Versus album, Hurrah, was not that great. Basically, I’m willing to let this new form of Versus grow on me if they stick around long enough. I would absolutely go see them again (contemplating whether they are worth trips to New York for) and I’m looking forward to the album.

At a certain point the quartet on stage was joined by a young chap on guitar (I believe they called him “Chris” but this was almost a month ago so I’m not certain) and Fontaine asked how many of us in the audience had a copy of The Stars Are Insane and proceeded to explain that Chris was the little kid in the album art. Crazy! So then my friends asked me whether or not that was Richard and Fontaine’s kid and I was like “I don’t even think they are a couple! he is maybe a nephew or something?” But it made me think. All those years of listening to this band, I never really even thought about their personal lives and relationships. Their lyrics are full of relationship sagas, but I never got the sense those stories were about each other. I honestly have no idea if they ever were/are a couple. How indie rock — boys and girls singing together and I barely ever even thought about them doing anything more than music with each other… though maybe this is due to my long-standing crush on Fontaine Toups.

Speaking of indie rock, Fontaine and Richard told an amusing story about the first time they played in DC, that Jenny Toomey got them to play a show at dc space with a bunch of “indie rock” bands, and that they didn’t know what indie rock was, or that they themselves might be indie rock. They said the indie rock kids terrified them. And that before they knew about indie rock, they thought they were “post-punk.” Ha.

Anyway I am glad that Versus is back in some form. As I get old and cranky, I’m falling into the typical old-person pattern of liking music from when I was 19 way more than I like the music of 19-year-olds today. Whatever.

Opening up for Versus was Soft Power, Mary Timony’s new band. I was pretty interested in seeing them; they’ve played a number of times in town over the past year or so but I had never made it to any of their shows. I was really impressed by the last iteration of the Mary Timony Band (with Devin Ocampo and Chad Molter from Medications/Faraquet) and their album The Shapes We Make. Also I’d seen Mary Timony play several times before and always like her performances.

But I wasn’t totally sold by Soft Power. I liked it, but something seemed off. Partly it was something about the sound and the stage presence: Mary’s vocals didn’t sound right, and she and the other singer (I don’t know his name) were constantly trading guitars and basses. Something just wasn’t quite right. But I’m interested in hearing more: musically it sounded like it had pretty good potential, a continuing progression for an interesting musician. There aren’t a whole lot of woman guitarists/singers like Mary Timony — disappointingly few — and the world definitely needs more girls who can rock out on guitar and who listen to prog. (Again, this was a while back, but Mary asked the crowd something like, “would you rather go on tour with the Scorpions or with Yes?” and despite my definite shout-out in favor of the Scorpions she was like, “I would totally choose Yes.” Man, I love the Scorpions…)

I’ll give Soft Power another chance, too. This was a fun show, gratifyingly filling up the backstage, and a good way to end the year. Though I still wish I had known about that Grant Hart show.

Tortoise played on Saturday night, July 7, and it was the fulfillment of my nine-year mission to see this band perform live. Was it worth the wait? Sure, I guess. I have liked Tortoise for a long time indeed, but I’m not obsessive about them or anything. I really enjoy the two albums of theirs I have (Millions Now Living Will Never Die and Standards) but haven’t really felt the need to get more. But in 1998 I was spending a semester in southwestern Germany and missing live music and clubs in DC, and there was this German kid named Nico who lived on the floor of my dorm who listened to American indie rock and stuff. At some point he invited me to go see Tortoise, who were playing somewhere in Baden-Württemberg that was not really accessible to car-less Americans, and I was excited to go, but in those days before cell phones (or “Handys” as the Germans call them) we never quite managed to figure out the logistics and I ended up missing the trip to see Tortoise. So for almost a decade I harbored a very mild regret.

Well at long last I got to see Tortoise and they were a lot of fun; I repeatedly found myself describing them as “very chill.” I was pleased that I knew a lot of the songs from the two albums I have, and I was impressed by the fact that the band seemed to be having so much fun on stage. I think their style of music — wacky time signatures, fitful starts and stops, unusual numbers of repetitions — would be fun to play, with entire concerts turning into a challenge of remembering what comes next. I also was digging the great percussion and the occasional use of the two-drummers-at-once technique. Great show.

On Thursday (July 12) was the Mary Timony Band/Medications show. Another lovely night at Fort Reno, with perfect weather, and an interesting pair of performances. I am a huge fan of both of these bands and have seen them both play a number of times so it was mostly a chance to admire the setting and relax to good music. As it turned out, the sound system was screwed up but the actual sound mix of the show was quite good. The openers, The Charm Offensive, were decent enough, a sort of garage-rock band, but I was most excited to see Medications.

Medications played a very solid show, though sort of subdued compared to other times I’ve seen them. At times I sat and watched in awe, because this band is so spot on, so damn in sync. I sent out an email inviting people to the show and said that they were one of the most talented DC bands ever, and I totally stand by that.

The relatively restrained performance might have been because Chad and Devin had to save up energy for their performance with Mary Timony, but her performance was pretty mellow too. But really good. She played almost all songs from her excellent new album, and occasionally they wandered pretty far into jammin’ prog-rock territory, but in a very cool way. There is a write-up of the show on the City Paper’s music blog comparing the performance to Yes, but my friends and I were comparing it to Rush. But I like Yes and Rush, so I was pleased. They faded out to a nice spacey song, “Pink Clouds,” as the last bit of sunlight disappeared and ended an almost perfect Fort Reno night…

Check out Mary Timony’s video for “Sharpshooter” (I love the lyrics to this song but the video is kind of cheesy…):

Finally, Les Savy Fav. Well this is another band I’ve wanted to see forever, and while the show was totally good, the moral of my Les Savy Fav show is that you shouldn’t go see bands you love for the first time at a solar-powered show. They were performing at this thing called citysol that turned out to be interesting in many ways, but not conducive to decent sound quality. So it was more like a sample platter of LSF — when I see them in a club someday it will still kinda be my first time….

Anyhow I had seen some clips of them before, and I have the DVD that came with their Inches album, so I knew they were gonna be all crazy. And they were. And it was awesome but the poor sound made it less awesome than it deserved. That was fine, it was still way fun; I was left a little disappointed but still convinced that they are one of the greatest bands around today. Also one of my friends and I got to compare and contrast Tim Harrington with Lungfish’s Dan Higgs.

Here’s a gothamist take on the show, some rad flickr photos, and a couple of video clips caught on cell phones and such:

Oh and finally a quick postscript: I was out of town (a recurring theme this summer) and missed the Black Cat’s annual Run For Cover event, but I heard it was great, and a friend sent me this link of highlights. Seems like I missed another great show.