You can tell that fans are really dedicated to a band by judging two things: how long in advance they line up in front of Amoeba for an in-store performance, and how long it takes to see the setlist of the performance in question to appear on Setlist.fm…. In the case of San Cisco, an indie band from Australia, it was a good sign an both accounts, a long line had formed hours before their in-store on Tuesday night, and the setlist was there when I got home. As happens sometimes, I had never heard of them although they released their first album in 2012, have headlined shows and played festivals, but, when it comes to Australian imports, I only know AC/DC, Tame Impala and of course the great Nick Cave… who actually is not living there anymore.
San Cisco played a very lively set, full of earworms, poppy dances, catchy tempos, and a youthful effervescence. With five new songs, they gave us a good taste of their new album ‘Gracetown’, which will only be released on the 17th via the band’s own Island City Records, but which was already made available at Amoeba for the fans’ greatest joy… Talking about these fans, I was once again feeling quite old, surrounded by kids and a lot of cute young girls excited to get close and personal with singer Jordi Davieson’ s handsome face.
During their songs they were plenty of boy-girls call-and-responses or harmonies between Jordi and drummer Scarlett Stevens, but also plenty of jangling guitars, hand clapping and happy choruses that had the potential for some serious sing-alongs… yes, what struck me the most was this happiness, this lightness, and explosion of youth… the performance was all ebullience and buoyancy, people were bouncing between the store rows, although the band was staying very serious, especially Jane (I hope I got her name right) who was replacing their bass player Nick Gardner, out of action after accidentally shooting himself in the foot… What? No joking, it looks like Australia is still the far far west.
Musically, they sounded at times like Vampire Weekend minus some too obvious African guitars, or the Arctic Monkeys minus the big rock riffs, they simply were an indie rock band doing almost everything upbeat. Their brand of pop was definitively very bubbly and explosive, and on certain songs like ‘Awkward’, I thought they could as well be playing in concert with this other indie band called Saint Motel.
However, the new album is said to explore their sonic universe a bit further, and one of the new song entitled ‘Snow’, had some squeaking synth and was far less joyous and catchy, bringing some serious cloudiness in their too-bright sun, but that was the only shade I could detect all set long. In any case, all the songs were acclaimed with the same enthusiasm by fans, and they seemed to focus on the only thing that matters at this age: relationships, puppy love and heartaches…so why were their songs so happy and bouncy? oh but they nevertheless don’t go very far in that area, ‘Gave my heart to Isabella/she’s bad news but I’m no better/Gave my heart to Isabella/now I wish I never met her’, they sing in their new single ‘Run’, or ‘And God knows/That it’s a common misconception/That I’m the only one for you/And I can take you out for breakfast/But he could take you ’round the world’ they sing in ‘Fred Astaire’… you figure it out, this kind of stuff, but tons of very successful songs in the 60’s were not heavy philosophy either, so why should I judge? On ‘Wash It All Away’, Jordi Davieson had this happy falsetto and they got in a very playful mode with a sort of 60’s vibe and the shade of the Kinks.
They had a sold-out show the same night at the Troubadour, which means their bright and bouncy pop is in high-demand in California right now, so catch them before they definitively explode.
Setlist
1 About You
2 Too much Time Together
3 Awkward
4 Snow
5 Wash it All Away
6 Run
7 Fred Astaire
More pictures of the show here.
