It’s kind of amazing in retrospect that They Might Be Giants have established a career that has lasted almost three decades. On their first album, John Linnell played keyboards and accordion, John Flansburgh played guitar, and the duo used a drum machine to fill in the empty space. Who would have thought that the guys that wrote “Youth Culture Killed My Dog” and “Put Your Hand Inside the Puppet Head” would still have a viable career? The two Johns have proven that ingenuity and hard work are a potent combination.
This was my seventh They Might Be Giants concert and I have over 500 songs by the band or their side projects on my iPod. I was concerned that the group often pushes the new product hard during their shows and their latest album, Nanobots which was just released last week, is the most undistinguished of their career. In the past five years, the band has released two albums of outtakes (Album Raises New and Troubling Questions and Cast Your Pod to the Wind) which are better than Nanobots.
TMBG have had the same lineup for years. Mary Beller abuses his drum kit with great ferocity while Danny Weinkauf effortlessly emits waves of melody from his bass. Dan Miller takes up most of the lead guitar work to all John Flansburgh to be the focal point of the show. Flansburgh, who seems to be more disheveled and heavier each time I see him, mugs for crowd, jumps up and down in time with the music, and dramatically plucks out one note at a time while jerking his guitar at different angles. He’s the nerd rock Rick Nielsen. TMBG sold out the Granada Theater in Dallas last year, but there was a smattering of empty seats for this show. The band does not attract the beautiful people. If a terrorist group were to successfully target a They Might Be Giants show, a major metropolitan area would have no more junior high school science teachers.
TMBG were as good as their material on this evening and unfortunately the audience never got more than two good songs in a row. The opened with “You’re on Fire,” which also kicks off the Nanobots and this song about a lady with a combustible head is the most serviceable tune on the album. “When Will You Die?” is a deliciously distasteful treat and “Cloissone” is one of the band’s best recent efforts. Almost nothing from Nanobots worked in the live setting and starting the encore with a new song, “Tesla,” was a real momentum killer.
As for the good stuff, “Dr. Worm” was the first triumph of the evening and “New York City” is a beautiful rock ‘n’ roll postcard. “The Guitar,” the band’s satire of “The Lion Sleeps Tonight,” is always a winner onstage and “The Mesopotamians” is bewilderingly brilliant. And, honestly, “Birdhouse in Your Soul” is one of the best songs ever written. There was a lot to love at this show (including the sock puppet skit from “The Avatars of They”) and an equal amount of disappointing material. See this band in a year when they get Nanobots out of their system. Keep the nightlight on inside the birdhouse in your soul for them.
Grade: B.
Setlist:
You’re on FireW
When Will You Die?
Memo to Human Resources
Celebration
Call You Mom
Fingertips
Cloisonne
Dr. Worm
Whistling in the Dark
Famous Polka
Circular Karate Chop
James K. Polk
The Guitar
People Verus Apes
They’ll Need A Crane
Insect Hospital
He’s Loco (The Avatars of They)
The Mesopotamians
Nanobots
Lost My Mind
New York City
Birdhouse in Your Soul
1st Encore
Tesla
Damn Good Times
Withered Hope
2nd Encore
Istanbul Not Constantinople