Live: Broken Social Scene Presents Kevin Drew

Kevin Drew is my hero. If this were ever more true, it is after seeing him with Broken Social Scene backing him (pretty much the same thing) live at The Orpheum Tuesday the 30th of October. “Kevi” as his peers call him, keeps getting more mystical and more attractive the more I see him and hear his music. As I’ve mentioned before, my most listened to record of all time is Broken Social Scene’s self titled record, and this new release Spirit If… falls nothing short of amazing. The whole atmosphere and the way the show was put together really added to the magic of the night too. It really dawned on me further the other night seeing this show how much better a band is live when the show is loud. This show was nice and loud and the mix was amazing to boot. Whenever the horn players blared in with their respective parts, it was even louder than the rest of the music, which I was more than ok with. Kevin’s banter was really good too and he (and the rest of the band) had a sort of relaxed comfortable attitude about the whole show which made it more entertaining and made the audience comfortable. It’s pretty much the same thing as having tea and cuddling with them for a few hours. Kevin was also a touch sick, yet really pulled it all off, and I didn’t hear a missed note the whole time…well nothing more than is the usual Kevin voice crackle.

After they got announced by a KCRW DJ at the opening of the show, then came on very nonchalant, slowly picked up their gear and meandered about. They kind of made some noise and Kevin started talking about nothing in particular for probably a good 5 minutes before they started into the first song which was “Lucky Ones” off Spirit If…. Before the show started I really didn’t know how many BSS songs they were going to do and would be happy to even get a few, and low and behold, just the second song in they graced us with “Cause = Time”. They ran the gamete of their catalog, and played songs I didn’t think I’d hear like “7/4 Shoreline” and the fast version of “Major Label Debut” off EP to Be You and Me.

Near the beginning of the show Kevin announced that the show would be 5 acts throughout the set and after a chunk of songs or so, announced a new act number which would often bring an new member to the group. One of the acts (I believe act 3) brought Andrew Kenny from American Analog Set (who was playing keyboard for BSS already that night) who got up and did one of his own songs, and the 4th act brought a new member Emily Haines of Metric. She has previously tried to ruin songs and records by Broken Social Scene, and tried REALLY hard to ruin this show. She somehow manages to barely scrape by with her songs on BSS records and they miraculously end up being good. “Anthems” as an example is a good song and somehow “Swimmers” is good too but out of principle I have trouble admitting it. Her first song with them that night was “Anthems”, followed by “7/4 Shoreline” and “Almost Crimes” because you might as well if you have a girl singer there. According to Kevin, Emily flew down for this show and they wont be playing those songs live on the rest of the tour. I was very happy to hear those songs and they sounded amazing, but Emily’s voice compared to Feist’s is like a cat getting stuck in a running car engine to angels floating down and nestling in you bringing you warmth and joy. Emily Haines tried to ruin BSS again, but failed to do so and no matter what evil power she lays on the band, they will continue to override it because BSS can’t ever be brought down by any evils. Her credit though is given for “Anthems” and admittedly she did sound pretty good on that song.