I knew that arriving at 5:30 pm at Amoeba would be a problem for a Best Coast show there are simply too many people with too much free time in Los Angeles! This large crowd of young people had filled up the store very quickly, as if it were one of these famous bands,… but what do I say? Best Coast is quite huge in its hometown! I arrived too late to see the big line outside the store, but there was one, a big one turning around the block. It was a crowd of girls, lots of Latino girls, with gay guys or straight guys, all looking very young to me, having that same Silver-lake-hipster-in-the-know look. Interesting, Amoeba staff had decided to do a little game before the show and they asked people ‘be the first one to show a high school ID’ and it’s simple 99% of the people there, rose something in the air! Awww, Best Coast, the queen of LAUSD!
Accompanied with her 3 musicians, she appeared on stage acclaimed by a very enthusiastic crowd, wearing a plaid green mini-skirt and a white t-shirt with matching green dots – I saw a bit later that the dots were little alien heads. Starting with ‘This lonely Morning’, they played a dynamic set of their power pop songs with not much stopping along the short songs. Bethany Cosentino’s voice just dominated everything, there’s actually a lot of vocals in all these tracks, and her distinct girlie-group-meets-ennui great voice was never buried in the music. Her voice is a sort of signature for the band, always navigating between some pure inspiration of 60s girl groups and punk boredom.
October 22nd was the release date of their new EP, ‘Fade Away’, and the band played a lot of songs off it of course as well as a few Best Coast classics, such as ‘Crazy for You’, ‘Boyfriend’ or ‘The Only Place’ that Bethany dedicated to all of us, adding that the song was about ‘our fair city of Los Angeles’ and ‘our beautiful state of California’. Bethany, who should work for this state’s department of tourism, played with a great assurance but she was a bit starstruck as she explained she used to come at Amoeba to see shows when she was a little teenager, adding ‘and that wasn’t too long ago’, visibly amazed she was there now in front of such a large crowd. But this was hardly surprising, the girl is touring non-stop the world, for god’s sake!
The new songs didn’t strike me as a big departure from Best Coast’s style of power choruses sang by Bethany’s strong chords, and all of them were greatly pleasing the fans. Although I could hear a few different things here and there, the chord progressions, the repetitions and the melodies of these new songs sounded instantaneously familiar. Best Coast is certainly a very enjoyable band seeing live, and I like them fine, but I had always had the feeling a bit was missing from their music to make me love them. Too simplistic lyrics? Too much repetition? May be they are on this direction as I really liked that new song ‘Fear of my identity’ which seemed to add a new dimension to their too often one-dimension world.
They signed their EP after the show, the signing was sold out, the security guards had to chase ‘groupies’ who wanted to take too many pictures for their taste? Best Coast has certainly achieved a real indie success and Bethany can afford to make a mistake in the 60s-inspired ‘I don’t Know How’, make a large smile, say sorry, and continue the song with the same natural. That’s really what people like about her, the honest lack of sophistication, the down-to-earth-girl not afraid to scream banalities about love and life. She is certainly not fading away and everybody is crazy for her.
Setlist
1 This Lonely Morning
2 Who Have I Become
3 The Only Place
4 Fear of my Identity
5 Fade Away
6 I Wanna know
7 Crazy for you
8 I don’t Know How
9 Boyfriend
