The best indie rock show in the Midwest over the weekend took place on the shores of Lake Erie.
With Spoon and The Beths co-headlining a show Saturday night outside the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, I defy you to find a better bill in this swath of the United States.
The bands are in the midst of a summer tour together and proved at a sold-out show that they beautifully complement each other.
The Beths’ hour-long set of harmony-laden power pop showcased its understated but clearly mastered craftsmanship. There’s nothing flashy about the Auckland, New Zealand quartet but its music is deceptively simple. Songs like “I’m Not Getting Excited,” “Jump Rope Gazers” and “Little Death” do a lot with a little, hewing close to the recorded versions in a way that isn’t imitation but rather impressive precision.
The band, led by lead singer and guitarist Elizabeth Stokes, came off as consummate road dogs. It was another strong set in a string of them that Cleveland has seen in recent years, including a stop last November at the Globe Iron. Luckily, the band changed up the setlist a bit on Saturday, adding a few songs, including highlight “Roundabout,” that it didn’t trot out last time.
Spoon, meanwhile, hadn’t played in Cleveland since a 2017 show at the House of Blues. The Austin, Texas quartet—joined by a touring musician and anchored by the two mainstays, guitarist and lead singer Britt Daniel and drummer Jim Eno—delivered a taut, 18-song set showcasing songs from its entire career.
The music was muscular, noisy and melodic, often in the same song. Eno’s strong backbeat was the perfect bed for Daniel’s distorted guitar stabs and the band’s penchant to stretch out (just a little, mind you, as a song was just as likely to abruptly end as it was to last another minute). And Daniel, three decades into the band’s career, has turned into a somewhat arresting frontman, constantly on the move and contorting his thin frame to the myriad sounds surrounding him.
While the performance featured a few deep cuts like “Inside Out,” it was heavy on the band’s best-known songs like “The Way We Get By,” “I Turn My Camera On” and “The Underdog.”
An undeniable high point, though, was when Daniel brought out Dan Boeckner of Wolf Parade/Divine Fits (which also featured Daniel and fellow Spoon-er Alex Fischel). The band and Boeckner, now a Cleveland-area resident, ripped into Wolf Parade’s “Modern World” before dusting off a cover of The Rolling Stones’ “Sway.”
In the end, the tight professionalism of The Beths was the perfect introduction for Spoon’s noisy nuggets. It doesn’t get much better than that.
Squirrel Flower, the project of Chicago artist Ella Williams, opened with 30 minutes of brooding singer/songerwriter-ish tunes that only hinted at the power she could conjure with a full band (which she will undoubtedly do at a Sept. 23 show at the Grog Shop). Along with a few electric guitars, her music succeeded because of the power of the melodies and lyrics, including a song called “Cleveland,” which is slated for her new album due in August.
And with a lyric like “don’t you want a home in Lakewood? Back porch with a lakeside view,” Williams clearly did her homework.
The Beths setlist:
1. Straight Line Was a Lie
2. No Joy
3. Out of Sight
4. Roundabout
5. Future Me Hates Me
6. Knees Deep
7. I’m Not Getting Excited
8. Jump Rope Gazers
9. Metal
10. Til My Heart Stops
11. Little Death
12. Expert in a Dying Field
Spoon setlist:
1. Wild
2. The Hardest Cut
3. I Turn My Camera On
4. My Mathematical Mind
5. The Way We Get By
6. Finer Feelings
7. Do You
8. Modern World (Wolf Parade cover, with Dan Boeckner)
9. Sway (The Rolling Stones cover, with Dan Boeckner)
10. I Summon You
11. Out Go the Lights
12. Inside Out
13. Love Right to Your Door
14. You Got Yr. Cherry Bomb
15. Rent I Pay
16. TV Set (The Cramps cover)
Encore:
17. The Underdog
18. Trouble Comes Running
Eric Heisig is a freelance writer in Cleveland. He can be reached at eheisig@gmail.com.
Photos below by George Michaels.
