story / Leslie Blodgett + David Leigh Abts
photos / Â Elizabeth A. Abts
CALL IN A FAVOR IF YOU STILL NEED TICKETS TO THE DANDY WARHOLS’ SOLD-OUT WORLD TOUR….
It’s early May and the pools have all just opened in Nashville, Tennessee. Courtney Taylor-Taylor, lead singer of The Dandy Warhols, takes an afternoon dip. He mutters something about exercise, or maybe he just likes swimming. We follow our ears to the Mercy Lounge, where the legendary Oregon bandits are nearing the end of a mostly sold-out U.S. Spring Tour. We arrive as they are sound checking to “Boys Better.” The song is one of the constants in their 20-years-and-running brainwashing experiment to mold mankind into a sexier race.
They invite us backstage while opening act The Warlocks warm up. For some reason Zia McCabe, the multi-instrumentalist, is stuck with two G-key harmonicas. To avoid a Code Red, someone runs out to grab a C. Tonight she’s also prepped her signature keyboard and tambourine; a bass, a melodica; and various knobs, synths, and noises.
The band has joked to press before that they don’t know how to play their instruments. We think they mean the music has invented them as much as the other way around. After 20 years, Zia is the heir apparent to Stevie Nicks. Later in the evening she’ll do a solo about a daisy tattoo on her toe, but the real measure of her musicianship is the tambourine bruise on her thigh that has blossomed into a callous.
“It’s not a callous,” she corrects us. “It’s just conditioned!” She applies eyeliner and asks whether we’re including this in the write-up.
“Keep it in,” suggests band cofounder and guitarist Peter HolmstrĂ–m. His expression is deadpan, like Bill Murray. “No problem getting ‘the condition’ past the fact checkers.”
Like siblings, all four of them chuckle and move on. Out front the doors open, and soon everyone is rocking out to the high-spirited Warlocks. They are killing it, and as they remind the crowd: “It’s good to be in Dandyland!”
Just before the suspense is too thick to drink, the Dandys materialize onstage. Drummer Brent DeBoer‘s presence dominates center right, laying a beat that you can feel in your chest, and we suspect all the rib cages will be sore the next day. Soon every heart in the room is in sync with the drums.
Zia is holding up stage right with her playground of toys. “Bring us the West Coast!” someone shouts from the audience. She grins and shouts back: “Are you talking about weed?”
Meanwhile, across the stage, Pete slices into his riffs like he’s drinking from Slash’s grail. His guitar is the voice of reason in a group that commands a little chaos, and this gives the band’s sound its fluidity.
Courtney is behind the wheel of this performance machine. The audience can’t help themselves; throughout the set they are tossing him bouquets of “I love you Courtney!” Here in what he calls “Nashville with a capital G,” twentysomethings on a mission to reinvent rock party peacefully alongside 70-year-old honky tonkers. It’s a motley crew, but no one is here to play Fashion Police on Courtney’s watch; everyone is too busy enjoying the set.
The place is packed. The band is giving everything to the show, and the audience is giving everything to the band, and everyone gives everything they’ve got. At the end of the night everyone goes home in their underpants, and the venue staff are left to sweep the bras off the floor.
So, the choice is yours. Bask in their tutelage as soon as you can: this summer they’re hitting Europe, then Australia, and will head back for another tour in the States in the fall.
Or, you can keep waiting for Miley Cyrus’s Second Coming.
The band’s first-ever live record, Thirteen Tales from Urban Bohemia: Live at The Wonder—the new incarnation of their beloved 2000 constitution—dropped in March. The LP has two bonus tracks. Visit http://www.dandywarhols.com/.
For more words from David Leigh Abts and Leslie Blodgett, read Mother’s Day at the Orphanage, “a collection of anecdotes, short stories, and misadventures.” Visit www.mothersdaystories.com.
For more picture go here!
