KEEP IT DOWN NOW...PLEASE!
Imagine yourself in a kind of raggedy high school auditorium. You are surrounded by mainly straight couples, median age about 45, all of whom appear rather humorless. It's stuffy in the medium-sized room and the blinking red light of an expiring "Exit" sign-just noticeable out of the corner of your left eye-provides the only visual stimulation. Blink…sigh…blink…sigh…blink…This, my friends, is sadly what it felt like to be present at the Aimee Mann concert at the James A Little Theater last Wednesday.
Mann herself proved not only a trouper, but a hell of a professional and an electrifying performer and songwriter. Kicking off with a few songs from her new concept album (yes, they're back apparently) The Forgotten Arm, Mann was not the dour, depressed soul from the
Magnolia
soundtrack that I expected, but rather a charming rocker, clearly inspired by the '70s and backed by an amazing group of musicians. Live, even "Save Me," perhaps her most well-known song, sounded more like an Allman Brothers jam than the suicide note it appears to be on record.
But Mann was battling more than her own demons-there was an overall atmosphere of torpor at this show that was unique in its intensity, that ultimately overwhelmed the splendid things that were going on onstage. I've spent about a week obsessing over the details, trying to figure out what the hell went wrong with this show?. Here's what I've come up with:
UH, IT WAS AT JAMES A LITTLE
This is a very crucial time, Santa Fe. The Paramount is gone, fine, we can accept that. But from the death of one thing a flower blooms, etc., etc. That is, we took the Paramount for granted-it was the perfect venue for things like an Aimee Mann show-but now we're gonna have to work for it, and the potential is there for something new and amazing, such as creating a mid-sized venue at the Railyard (which, barring some miracle, ain't gonna happen), or reconfiguring the way we use the Lensic (which we are in the midst of doing to some extent), or figuring out what to do with the space we've got lying around. This latter stage has in fact begun: The old MVD on West Alameda will, god and investors willing, house Santa Fe's newest queer bar, Bar Noir, starting in December, and it should be a good size for smallish shows, should the owners decide to go in that direction. There is also a large, empty space next to El Paseo, and FanMan Productions' Jamie Lenfesty (who also produced the Aimee Mann show) plans on opening it up, in conjunction with El Paseo, as a venue. All good ideas, but in the meantime we've got…a high school auditorium, the James A Little. Man, can that place bring you down. The ambiance at James A Little is the equivalent of reading a dozen Russian novels at once-bleak, stark and bleached of any emotion except angst and existential questioning. Even the lobby proved devoid of any of the usual upbeat concert chatter-people made a beeline for their seats, most likely to escape the dry atmosphere. I mean, literally dry-no beer, no soft drinks, no nuthin'. I felt like whispering, "Perhaps, sir, I might have a few drops of water to quench my dry throat and feverish brow? No? More gruel? No? Perhaps a crust of bread? No? OK, maybe I can find some old gum or something under my seat." A concert should be a fun event: You get there early, grab a drink, chat with some friends, maybe buy a T-shirt, maybe some popcorn. This felt more like a Homeland Security conference.
You can't really blame Lenfesty for the atmosphere. He had a chance to grab Aimee Mann, bring her to Santa Fe for the first time in something like 12 years, and he had nowhere to put her. I just pray that by the time the next chance rolls around, we'll have a fitting arena, one where at least I can get a Coke or something.
UM, TICKETS WERE $35
Look, I did not pay for my ticket. I was comped so that I could review the show (and, lest you get angry because I get comped and you don't, after this article I assume I will never get free tickets to anything else again). And to be honest, even though I love Aimee Mann and I think she's one of the few intelligent, relevant, and generally badass artists of our time, I doubt I would pay $35 to see her, at least not at the James A Little. This is no dis on Mann-I doubt, frankly, I would pay $35 to see the unveiling of the Ark of the Covenant at the James A Little. Mann's demographic spans, more than most popular musicians, a varied age group, to be sure, but they were not all represented and I think the $35 was why canes, gray hairs and sweater vests outnumbered college students by a large ratio.
In and of itself, this fact is not necessarily bad, but as the show wore on, it became clear the aura needed as much youthful energy as it could get, and considering the fact that the amount of people under 30 numbered about four, it just wasn't gonna happen. The result: Mann played her heart out, kicked ass, engaged in witty stage banter, was charming and cool and smart, but she was met with tepid applause, no dancing and a lot of rudeness.
ER, THE OLD PEOPLE LEFT EARLY
What kind of rudeness? One, people brought their children to the show. In theory, bringing children to an Aimee Mann concert is actually a cool thing to do. As long as it's a smoke- and alcohol-free show in a non-threatening venue, it's a good way to expose your kids to rock 'n' roll. But, hey, if your child is too young to not know that yelling out indiscriminately in the middle of a song is annoying and distracting, either take him to the lobby (I know, there was nothing to do there, but take one for the team) or don't bring him to the show. Second, starting about 9 pm-half an hour before the show ended-people just started getting up and leaving. This was not the kind of disgusted getting up and leaving one does when a show sucks, but rather the "Oops, gettin' past my bedtime" kind of leaving. And we're not talking one or two people here-it was a stunning exodus and it was mortifying for those of us who stuck around. What kind of person pays $35 to see a top-notch performer and then bails well before it's over? Well, it ain't college folks.
Finally, I am consistently shocked by the amount of yammering by audience members that occurs at concerts in Santa Fe, but this one really took the cake. There were separate conversations going on in front of me, to the side and behind me. Not just a sentence or two, but entire diatribes and arguments, spoken not in whispers but in normal voices. It was like a freakin' Mamet play. I almost wished it were a Homeland Security conference at that point, so the brownshirts could come in and put a stop to the blathering with a jackboot to the neck or at least a steely glare. But no, before they got up to leave early, many of the people sitting near me felt free to discuss how good their dinner was at Geronimo, or how they should snatch up the works of a hot young local artist before the price goes up. So in lieu of a jackboot, I only have the arsenal of Mann's words: Hush, hush, people. Voices carry like a motherfucker.
