In a very short amount of time, Christopher Owens quit his band Girls when it was at the top of its success and soon released a solo album, ‘Lysandre’ in 2013, then another one ‘A New Testament’ the following year, and surprised everyone by dropping a third one, ‘Chrissybaby Forever’, just a few days ago. However, the sad truth is that people have paid far less attention to him since his Girls days, I have been guilty of this too and I wonder why. Could it be that his two first solo efforts didn’t exactly rise to the expectation after the immense success of ‘Father, Son, Holy Ghost’? I saw Girls when they were touring the album in 2011 and the Fonda theater was packed to the roof, the stage was grandiose with flowers everywhere, they brought dramatic and explosive guitars, a gospel-ish choir with wobbling keyboard, the show was alternating between an empowering sound and Chris Owens’ intimate vocals, and they seemed to have a big vision… But it looks like Owens totally dropped this ambitious vision to play his personal songs in much, much smaller venues.
I was a bit chocked to learn that Christopher Owens would be playing at the Echo on Thursday night, because it is such a small club! and if the place was really packed – something easy to accomplish for him – the show had almost nothing to do with the high-reaching Girls gig at the Fonda a few years ago. Last night show was the beginning of a tour that he started in San Francisco the day before, and it was certainly a good occasion to see this intimate performer in his right environment: a small cozy place where an all-wide-eyed young girl can directly speak into his ear to ask him the setlist at the end of the show. All Girls’ fans should definitively jump on this touring opportunity, they will never get closer. However, Owens is not a talker, or not even a performer who seems to enjoy a lot of crowd interaction, the whole time he kept a shy demeanor, standing facing his drummer located on the left of the stage and slightly turning his back to a large part of the audience,… but that was alright, since I was standing very close to his thin figure.
The set was very simple, Chris and his three musicians opened with a few Girls’ songs from the band’s first EP ‘Broken Dreams Club’, then alternated between a lot of the new songs and more tunes from Girls’ self titled album, totally ignoring ‘Father, Son, Holy Ghost’ or even his two other solo albums. Is this what he meant when he said in an interview that this record was ‘really about getting back to the basics’? May be he meant the basics which made Girls’ debut so loveable because the music was so full of bright guitars and slices of the 60’s-70’s, producing lovely heartbreaking tunes sounding so familiar at the first listening? Honestly the new songs were fitting very well among the old ones, and may be the only ones which detached themselves from the rest were the louder abrasive-distorted ‘Big Bad Mean Motherfucker’ because of its full-rocker-Chuck-Berry upbeat style, and ‘Summertime’ because of its fuller sound. The rest was sweet, peaceful, even tearful, filled by Chris’ fragile and emotional vocals, which were sometimes a bit buried in the jangling guitars, upbeat drums and occasional shy harmonica, but always floating bravely above the mix of numerous noises from birds chirping to light whistling. He went back to basic, back to acoustic, back to simple chords and simple songs, and all these songs had a very summery feeling, a rare serenity that was certainly absent in some of these Girls songs. I was wondering why the guy behind me was head banging the whole time because there was certainly no ‘Vomit’ or ‘Die’ here – and I must admit I partially miss this great turmoil – and there was certainly nothing as catchy as ‘Honey Bunny’,… everything was about love, love, love, stars shining bright and everything sounded very optimistic, affirming a will to living, song after song, heart-on-his-sleeve, music-on-his-heart.
‘Selfish Feelings’, or ‘Coffee and Tea’ and ‘Inside Out’ with their start-and-stops, truly sounded like Girls song, then there were the playful child-like keys of ‘What About Love’ and the lightness playfulness of ‘Heroine’ which again sounded like an old-time classic, and proving that Chris Owens is definitively an old soul. Just before the encore, during ‘Lauren Marie’, ex-Girls member and Owens’ close friend John Anderson jumped on stage to finish the song with Owens’ guitar and this culmination of emotion ended in a warm hug between the two guys, accompanied by a big inner awww from the crowd. At this moment, I am sure everybody was thinking at unison, ‘I wish he was still with Girls’? This will probably be always in the back of our minds, but with his blonde hair hiding his face, fragile vocals and his vulnerable appearance, Chris Owens looks so frail at time, you just wonder if he can put on a show, but after a few minutes, you are convinced he certainly can!
Setlist
Heartbreaker
Alright
Out of Bed (Lazy Head)
Oh Boy
Substance
Selfish Feelings
Coffee and Tea
Me Oh My
God Damned
Summertime
When You Say I Love You
Ghost Mouth
What About Love
Music of my Heart
Inside Out
Big Bad Mean Motherfucker
Another Loser Fuck Up
Heroine (Got Nothing Oh You)
Broken Dreams Club
Headache
Lauren Marie
Encore
Take Care of Myself Again
Come on and Kiss Me
