New York – Northampton, Mass.’ Speedy Ortiz brought its unique brand of indie rock to Irving Plaza this past Saturday night. The show was part of the Oh My Rockness Turns 10 Fest, which continues next Saturday. For opening night, the band was joined by D.C.’s Give and Ontario’s Fucked Up.
Speedy Ortiz opened with “Tiger Tank,” off their 2013 album Major Arcana. With its clever lyrics and muddy, distorted riffs, the song was a perfect introduction. The band’s vocalist/guitarist Sadie Dupuis’ rhyme-heavy lines, like “I smoked my senses / It made me so demented / I see me and you with the kennel cough / signaling the sleuths of the trail we trot,” form one key element of the Speedy Ortiz sound. The band’s lyrics are steeped in words that most people haven’t used since studying for the SATs (like “interred”, “despondent” and “languorous”). Most bands have a less-complex vocabulary, so Speedy Ortiz risks coming across as pretentious and perhaps even isolating. Instead their vernacular makes them simply clever. And it was that cleverness, paired with their impressively experimental instrumentals, which earned them the cult following that cheered on song after song at Irving Plaza.
Despite all the multi-syllabic words, Speedy Ortiz songs still have a universal quality to them, caused in part by the bluntness that Dupuis weaves in. In “Plough,” the evening’s second song, Dupuis yowls, “Stop shaking. Why you freaking the fuck out? You better stop ‘cuz it’s freaking me out.” It’s a sentiment everyone in the audience could follow. The lyrics break away from the verboseness—which is perhaps fed by Dupuis’s pursuit of a poetry M.F.A. at UMass Amherst—in moments like these. The same can be said for the opening lines of “No Below” which the band broke out into next.
They continued to raise the bar, this time sonically, with their heavily distorted, sludgefest of a sound. “No Below,” also off Major Arcana, filled the venue with its slow plodding guitar. Dupuis sang about childhood friends as bassist Darl Ferm and guitarist Devin McKnight wandered around stage left. Both jerked the necks of their instruments forward and back, punctuating their parts, and holding still perhaps only for the wailing guitar break in the song. There doesn’t seem to be any shoegazing in this band. Each member plays passionately, giving it their all, physically. Of all the bandmates, Dupuis was the closest to static and perhaps only because she was tethered to a mic. Otherwise they played an exhausting set; their energy transferring onto the equally excited audience.
The song, “Hexxy,” produced the same effect. The fast-paced track featured the unexpected guitar parts that have come to exemplify the Speedy Ortiz sound. The band has cultivated this strangely pleasing dissonance that sounds almost foreign amongst the power-chord driven songs of their contemporaries, but makes for an amazing show in a live setting.
During Saturday’s relatively short set, drummer Mike Falcone thumped away at his toms while McKnight contorted his fingers, swiping them furiously up and down his guitar neck. It was a treat for anyone with even the faintest appreciation for music. At a Speedy Ortiz show, it is easy to catch oneself staring at the band members with stupefied amazement. With Ferm bobbing along, swinging his bass through the air and Dupuis anchoring the act from stage right, the show was as much a visual experience as it was a sonic one. The band not only replicated their sound, but also the energy of the songs. Speedy Ortiz fan or not, there is something to be said for such a solid performance.
Zoe Marquedant
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