Tonight I went to see a band called The Features at a bar called Zanzabar in Louisville, Kentucky. It's the second time I've seen them at that venue. In fact, it's the second time I've seen them there this year.
Tonight's show has inspired me to post something that I wrote about the previous show that I saw in April. Here you go:
I watch the drummer when I'm at a show. It gives me a split-second heads-up on beat changes and other rhythmic oddities that I can incorporate into the conscious or unconscious dancing that I'm doing all the time.
The drummer for The Features exudes a quiet competence. He has a haircut that belongs to the hippest guy in IT or that marketing intern you need to watch out for. It's a haircut you can wear to work and get promoted, but it's cool. His shirt is tucked in.
I've seen The Features before so I know he's up to the task, but somehow I wasn't ready for what an awesome drummer he is.
The first couple of songs are unfamiliar. Evidently I can look forward to a new album. The drums seem workaday at first, and I'm aware of the drummer, but I don't know that I'm really paying Attention.
Then, just as it becomes clear that a sizable portion of the crowd - or at least the group packed up front - is here to see The Features (who are, it turns out, the opening act and not the headliner after all) the drummer loosens up. The beats are coming from his core and being effortlessly expressed through his various limbs and into the drumkit, but that's evidently not enough to satisfy his soul. He has flair that you can see in the curved tracks that his sticks are carving in the air. And he's doing some serious shoulder shimmy. AND there's a wiggle below his waist as he grooves on his stool, playing extra beats that, sadly, we cannot hear.
After a while it becomes clear why the drummer was allocated two water pitchers - one of them full - after the rest of the band had filled their cups before starting the set. Near the end of the set he's near the end of the second pitcher. I'm not sure how long the other has been empty. He grabs the curtain hanging at the back of the stage - it's heavy felt - and uses it to wipe the sweat from his brow. I've seldom been so drenched with sweat that wiping it off on a heavy felt curtain - a dusty heavy felt curtain - seems like a good idea, but obviously for him this is one of those times.
It was an awesome show, and on this occasion it was all about the drums.
I'm probably biased because of my drummer-focus. I mean, the singer is excellent, too. Screaming awesome, memorable lyrics beloved by the crowd-pack. On note and passionate and raw. And the keyboardist is, well, key to The Features' sound, and where would any band be without the bassist?
But the drummer . . . .
It's not often I want to be the drummer. In my most secret fantasies of fame I am the guy in front, getting all the attention and the credit, with none of the responsibility of being a human metronome. I mean, it's a lot of pressure being the drummer, keeping the beat, laying the foundation. It may be toward the back of the stage and out of the limelight, but still, it's on-stage and everyone will hear the result of each beat on each skin or cymbal or snare and if you can't keep the beat then get out of the kitchen.
The Features' drummer doesn't feel any pressure, though. He's just having a good time.
