FOW concert review

Got my first taste of Fountains of Wayne in concert on Tuesday evening, and as a recent fan, I came away more than pleased. I was surprised that tickets were only $20, odd I thought, but I guess besides "Stacy's Mom," it's still a rather cultish band. Webster Hall was busy but not really sold out, whereas lots of artists I've never heard of are packing the place.

(Side note: Webster Hall also hosted the first Iron Chef America specials, but I'm still trying to figure out how they got Kitchen Stadium to fit in that space. It's not the biggest of theaters -- at least on the main floor, there are lots of nooks and crannies where bars are set up.)

The crowd did cover a larger span of ages than you might expect, but there were probably as many 40-somethings as 20-somethings in the audience. It seems like there were as many early adopters as there were people like me, who picked them up at Welcome Interstate Managers. That also showed in the reaction to songs -- while "Someone to Love" and "Mexican Wine" went over big, so did "Denise" and "Radiation Vibe." And maybe given the slightly older skewing crowd, "Stacy's Mom" was just another song on the set (not even in the encore).

I was intrigued that it took so long between the opening act (Robbers on High Street -- very passable group) and FOW taking the stage, especially with a 20-minute soundcheck going after the supposed 10 p.m. start time. Maybe it had something to do with the lead singer's voice troubling him, not sure, but he did soldier on and didn't seem that much out of sorts. In fact, until the encore, it was the first time in a while that I could really pick out lyrics while at a concert.

Anyways, I was glad to finally see them in concert (and at a reasonable price, all things considered), next stop is the actual store. If you want more on the concert, Stereogum has a complete set list (except they forgot to add "Traffic and Weather" as the opener to the first encore), plus a video from one of the songs. My primary disappointment was that they didn't play "Red Dragon Tattoo." But that's just a minor quibble.