Stars, Polaris, 2.23.06

Venue shuffling moved Stars from Beyond to Polaris, a sketchy dance club in bum-town. Waiting in line had a clash of civilizations feel to it, the long line of rich, white OCees next to half a dozen black panhandlers. Some of them had set up a tent next to a man-hole and were warming themselves next to the steam. I gave one dude $2 for directing me to a parking spot. But enough about the poor.

Polaris has a large, smoky dance floor surrounded on two sides by booths with the bar in the back. I guzzled a couple of Lagers during the opening act, Magnet.

Melancholy, Norweigan, Howie Day-esque, just him and his guitar (and fx).





My pictures for the whole night are mediocre. It's either the smoke or I was too far away, but have fun with them anyway.

I hadn't realized Stars, of Montreal (but not Of Montreal), provided two pieces of Broken Social Scene--singer/guitarist Amy Millan and bassist Evan Cranley--until the day of the show, so seeing them (she has a lovely voice, incidentally) felt significant. Otherwise, I wasn't expecting too much because I had my doubts about how well this lo-fi indie pop would translate into a live act. It turned out pretty well, aided in large part by the lively, charismatic (drunk?) lead singer, Torquil Campbell, and in small part by their hott violinist, who apparently has no name and played no role at any time in the history of the band (according to Wikipedia and the band's own site). But I'm pretty sure we made eye-contact and she'll no doubt be seeking me out for a marriage proposal in due time. I had been worried the ad hoc venue would suck, but the sound was good and the show felt relatively intimate for such a big room.

The show: I don't know Set Yourself on Fire well enough to say if they played everything or if they played anything new or whatever, but they seemed to hit all the high points. There was also a cover of "Hungry Heart" in there (amid a roar of cheers and a smattering of boos, they dedicated it to New Jersey). Other dedications went out to Hall & Oates, every single person in the audience, Dick Cheney (for finally having the guts to actually shoot someone himself--come on guys, that was sooo last week; we're back to making racist jokes about Arabs now), and some jackass frat-boy named Jesse who has jackass friends. Overall, I give this concert a "good times" on the Crevans Scale.

I'll bet I would've loved Stars back in high school; Stars write a lot of songs about sex and death and high school-type emo topics, which seems to get the kids fired up. Me, I'm of late more into songs about rocking out, modern art, and rocking out to modern art (and, sure, sex and death, cause who doesn't love sex and death?).


The band had some pretty sweet lighting, without which all my pictures would have been total rubbish. There were seven players in the band. Can you spot them all?



Torquil and Amy sing us spanish techno...wait, no that's next week.



Mysterious goddess (left), Torquil (right) other dudes in background.



A particularly bright moment in the show allowed me to snap a shot, I guess.



Here, mysterious goddess has been replaced by mysterious guitarist.



More Torquil and Amy.



The last song of the encore was actually just a happy memory of the rest of the show, according to that guy.


Stars - "Ageless Beauty" (too obvious?)

UPDATE: The violinist is Genevieve Walker, and she's just there for the tour.