Patrick Watson, Les Breastfeeders @ El Rey, 3/19/07

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Yes ladies and gentlemen the Canadians took over the El Rey last night. Following Malajube’s final SXSW set I had no choice but to seek out more French-Canadian goodness upon my return home. Enter: M for Montreal @ the El Rey! In brief:

The El Rey
I always love seeing bands here. Nice theatre, centrally located, it’s the perfect sized room. Beers can be had for as low as $5 and although at that price point they are shit beers, damn it that’s two bucks beneath rival Troubadour any way you slice it. Only one person was tending bar Monday and although the crowd was sparse, she was slammed by Canadian music fan boozehounds. Viva El Rey!

Patrick Watson
I think Patrick Watson sort of blew me away. Holy shit, the dude can do the wailing voice loop pedal with the best of them. Buzz words: Buckley, M Ward, etc. Atmospheric as hell. High points included one guy using reverb on a balloon, big drumkit vs tiny drumkit showdown, and an acapella song wherein the band meandered throughout the room; Watson handling vocals sans mic with aplomb, drummer replete with toy kit in tow. Killer.

DJ James DiSalvio
I must admit that I timed everything ludicrously perfectly to arrive mere seconds before Watson took the stage and in the process skipped this guy. Caught him between bands. Not much to say. He’s billed as being from Bran Van 3000. They did that song about ’Drinking in LA’ that you forgot about. That said DiSalvio spun records, solid tunes, that’s what DJs do. No rocket science here.

Les Breastfeeders
They sounded tight. After Watson’s frankly stunning audial landscape, I didn’t actually have the stomach to stick around for the full set. The lead singer had a haircut straight out of the Monkees but he dressed like Jack White. I enjoyed the songs. Admittedly a bit puzzled by the one guy in a (what the hell is that – mohair!?) vest sans shirt, tight pants and tambourine. He seemed a bit much. PHOTO AFTER THE JUMP!

Plaster
I was too damn tired to stick around for Plaster, although their songs on myspace sounded pretty interesting. Somebody please review this band and tell me what I missed.

And Now For The Photo Of LES BREASTFEEDERS……..

jaimes!

This is Jaime’s Restaurant situated at 7th and Red River, Austin, Texas. Everybody inside the restaurant is breastfeeding right now and if you look closely you might see some rugrat going for the gold. Hell man I didn’t have a camera with me last night what do you expect.

FIN