NXNE Extra Series: Lightspeed Champion w/ Flowers Forever & The Explorers Club @ Lee's Palace

Chalk one up for the delightfully nerdy, because Devonte Hynes put on a highly entertaining show at Lee's Palace with his latest project, Lightspeed Champion. I'm only mildly familiar with his stuff, but I had read reviews and talked to friends about him, and I'll have to admit that my expectations were pretty high for the show. Thankfully, his performance was entirely up to par, as he played through a set of songs that I assume are mainly from his Falling Off The Lavender Bridge release. Besides the fact that his music is accessible and easy to listen to, he comes across as a very amicable guy. His between song banter was very genuine, making everyone in attendance feel at home. The songs of course were the highlight of his show, displaying a stripped down semi acoustic sound, complete with catchy verses and hooky chorus's. His inner geek was immediately apparent by the fact that The Incredible Hulk graces the cover of his t-shirts. Or at least it looks like someone who could be The Hulk. Follow that up with the fact that he donned a guitar with the Star Wars logo on it, and you're starting to get the idea that maybe he just don't care about the coolness factor. I'll have to admit that one of my favorite performances of the night was his blistering cover of the Darth Vader theme. Totally unexpected, totally random and totally awesome. I feel that this cover would have been an effective way to tame the savage Wampa Ice Creature from Hoth after he forcefully removed Young Luke Skywalker from his Taunton and dragged him to his lair, thereby preventing the need for medical droid 2-1B to apply bacta treatment to his wounds. Admit it, you know what I'm taking about.

Photos: Lightspeed Champion @ Lee's Palace on flickr.
Myspace: Lightspeed Champion

As far as opening acts go, I don't think it's possible for two acts to be more completely different. The first act of the night was South Carolina's The Explorers Club. I had been told that they sounded like The Beach Boys. I've always liked bands that sound like The Beach Boys. So I was looking forward to liking this band. And I did. And they sounded like The Beach Boys. Their harmonies were indefectible, concentrating mostly on notes in the higher octave. I'd be curious to know how these guys all met, because judging by appearances alone, they all seem to come from various walks of life. I don't think there's a Brian Wilson in the bunch, because lyrically they keep it simple, dwelling on topics like love and summer and summer and young love. But overall, this was a very fun, smile inducing show. I'll admit that when they closed with Johnny B. Goode, a part of me convulsed the way I generally do at weddings when a band plays it, but honestly, this was a pretty rockin' version of the song, with four guitars solo-ing together. (Is that an oxymoron?) This culminated with guitarist and vocalist James Faust doing a backfilp off of the ridiculously high Lee's Palace stage and actually landing on his feet (for a brief second before falling to his bum.) It don't get much funner than this!

Photos: The Explorers Club @ Lee's Palace on flickr.
Myspace: The Explorers Club

After the delightful sunny pop of The Explorers Club, Flowers Forever took a turn for the sinister and macabre. Three very scary glow in the dark giant heads graced the stage. This freaked me out. The band then requested that the lights be turned off so that they can create a cool effect with their green lighting and crazy strobe lights. For a guy who likes to take pictures with the world's worst point and shoot, this is not a good thing. They then proceeded to blast through a set of thrashy garage punk that I guess was supposed to sound demented and evil, but came across to me as simply sounding forced. The leader of the band is Derek Pressnall, the Oberst-esque guy from Tilly And The Wall. Looks like he's going out of his way to prove that this other project is not them. I'm thinking that he's probably right because I loveTilly And The Wall. To say that I don't know what to think about these guys would be putting it mildly. The ringing guitars sounded neat for a moment, but the blatant glamorizing of all things miserable for the purpose of convincing people that it's cool not to be happy just ain't for me. If you're genuinely not happy that's one thing, but I just wasn't buying this one.

Photos: Flowers Forever @ Lee's Palace on flickr
Myspace: Flowers Forever

My NXNE 2008 experience is just beginning and we'll see how quickly I can get reviews and things posted, but I'm not as speedy as I once was. However, there are a lot of things that I'll be doing over the next few days, so check back often for more wacky NXNE madness!