Sunday, February 3, 2008

Miss Fairchild - Now Bass Heavy

If I sat here for a few more minutes, I could count up the number of Miss Fairchild shows I've seen in the past year, but that's not really the point. Roughly speaking, I've seen five or six, all but two at Great Scott in Allston. As the Great Dunlap, Daddy Wrall, and Samuel P-Nice have honed their stage show, several props have come and gone. At first, I missed the large cell phone and onstage break-up call. More recently, I missed the posterboard prompts for "Love you like a sister / So you could never be / Younger than my sister / So you can't get with me."

That said, the most recent incarnation of the Miss Fairchild Show is by far the tightest and most club-rattling, not that there is now or ever has been any sense of menace or even the slightest tinge of bad-ass posturing. Now, Trick Johnson's bass and Todd the Rocket's drums ground the whole show with a rounder thump. Maybe the removal of the turntables has helped shift the balance down from treble toward bass. The keyboards, flute, and sax are still there, and Daddy Wralls vocals come through as manic and flexible as ever.

These adjustments along with several heavily re-worked versions of their earlier material have left me craving another show and the drenched sweaters and suit jackets that come with it.

You can find their website here.