Arcade Fire :: Chicago Theater :: 05.19.07

A SIGNAL EATS NOISE SPECIAL ROAD TRIP REPORT FROM CHICAGO

Before Arcade Fire's sold out show at the Chicago Theater last Saturday (the second of three such shows), my father asked me how they got to be so big.

"They made a great record," I replied.

"Well, making a great record isn't enough on its own to get a band this kind of success, right?" he replied. And he's right. Plenty of amazing albums languish on shelves, still shrink-wrapped, and lots of mediocre records sell millions. Arcade Fire certainly benefited from rave reviews on Pitchfork and other sites, and the buzz that came trotting along behind, but it sure doesn't hurt that they're a transcendent live band, the kind of group that has acolytes instead of fans.

As we found our way to our seats (sort of just stage right of center, about 20 rows back), openers Electrelane were working their way through a set of noisy and largely instrumental rock. General consensus was that the British quartet of women looked like a band straight out of the mid- to late-'90s, an association reinforced by their music, which shared roots with Sleater Kinney. Their set showed flashes of inspiration--Arcade Fire singer Win Butler couldn't say enough good things about them--but the Chicago Theater's a big space, the mix was not the greatest, and they just didn't seem to connect to the audience, although they were definitely warmly received. They were certainly interesting enough to warrant a closer look at their new album, No Shouts, No Calls.

As the lights came up and we found the other members of our party, it became clear what a phenomenal space the Chicago is. I've been to a handful of theater shows in my day--Sigur Ros, New Pornographers, and Belle and Sebastian recently, Robert Cray and, yup, Spin Doctors--and they're the best. You get a seat, you're usually guaranteed a pretty good sight line, and I'm pretty sure that bands love them.

The stage is strewn with instruments, including pipes from a pipe organ suspended from the rafters, and more amps than you can shake a stick at. A set of circular screens are arrayed around its edge, and a line of flexible lights attached to poles stand at the front of the stage.

After a mercifully short wait, the lights drop and Arcade Fire take the stage, launching immediately into "Keep the Car Running" from their latest, Neon Bible. There are 10 people up there, including two horn players, one with a bass clarinet and one with a french horn, and they hit the ground running. Win Butler, sporting the latest in 19th c. strongman fashion, manifests very little of a frontman mentality, and yet he's clearly leading the band. Like their countrymen (and women) Broken Social Scene, Arcade Fire are masters at broadcasting an all-in-the-family vibe from the stage, and the audience responded immediately.

By their third song, "Haiti," from Funeral,it was clear that they were playing each song as if it were their last. A lot of bands throw themselves into their music, but it can often come off as spectacle. Arcade Fire, however, made it feel, for lack of a better word, like church. There were plenty of stage dressings, including fiber optic cameras mounted around the stage that would send fisheye images of the band to be projected on the circular screens and on the curtains at the back of the stage, but none of the lights or the video took over the power of the music.

The set was drawn in equal parts from Funeral and Neon Bible, and, as is often the case, the live setting erased a lot of the distinction between the two records. Funeral may have been more directed, concerned primarily with the transfer of responsibility from one generation to the next, and Neon Bible might sound bigger and bolder, but it's clear that even if their second effort hasn't been lauded in the same way as their first, they're still mining a rich vein of material.

Personally, I couldn't get past Regine Chassagne's onstage antics. Dolled up like a cross between Madonna or Cyndi Lauper circa 1984, and dancing awkardly, drawing attention to herself constantly, she came off like a Canadian Bjork, which is to the real Bjork as the Canadian dollar is to the American. However, she kicked some serious ass on the drums, especially on "Neighborhood #1 (Tunnels)", and her vocal performance was uniformly great, although especially on "Haiti." Learning that Chassagne (who's married to Win Butler, in case you didn't know) was born and raised in Haiti definitely makes the song resonate more deeply, and it also nicely complexifies the French bits of their songs, since the band is not just French-Canadian, but also Haitian. In any case, I can see that she's clearly a love her or hate her proposition, and a necessary counterweight in the band, so that's a push.

The rest of the band was going absolutely apeshit by the time they closed the set proper with the one-two punch of "Neighborhood #3 (Power Out)" and "Rebellion (Lies)". Tim Kingsbury was tossing a mic stand with a megaphone mounted on it high into the air again and again, and when they came back out for the encore ("My Body is a Cage" and "Neighborhood #2 (Laika)"), Kingsbury and Richard Reed Parry had begun to hit anything they had handy--the stage, the monitors, an a la carte crash cymbal. The crowd was itching for "Wake Up," but it was not to be on this night.

Some shows are nearly overwhelming, displaying the true power not only of the band performing, but of all music everywhere. Arcade Fire did make a great record, and then made at least a very good one, but it's clear from their live show that they've tapped into much more than just a successful formula for crafting wordless sing-along hooks and ramshackle narratives of loss and growth--they've made their own world, miraculously connecting the dots from '70s David Bowie to '80s Bruce Springsteen to the mossy glory of Neutral Milk Hotel. The trick is that they've made music that makes this path seem obvious and natural, even when no one ever really followed the path before.

It's a popular opinion that there's nothing truly new to say with music, that the borders are set and it's getting harder--if not impossible--to be original. But maybe there's still space in between to say the old things in a new way, to re-energize the old forms in bright new ways. Arcade Fire are living, breathing proof that tradition doesn't have to be an albatross and that the power of song and performance are enduring.

I caught Kyle Matteson, who runs arcadefire.net, at the show, so I'm sure he'll have a full setlist up over there pretty soon.