First off, I’d like to say that I love how the Wexner center puts together these “black box” events. Basically, they pull a curtain across the front of the main stage in and set up a second stage in the wing. The audience then stands on the main stage to watch the show. It really is a great use of the space for smaller shows and sounds great.
Openers for this event were High Places and Saturday Looks Good to Me. High Places, while interesting and certainly unique, got a little tedious and repetitive as their set went on. Equipped with a myriad of foreign percussion instruments and a looping station/effects processor, their sound was one of a kind. Saturday Looks Good to Me switched gears completely. This indie-pop group doesn’t really shine above any other indie-pop groups, but they’re good. The only real twist that they’ve got is the fact that singer/lead guitarist, Fred Thomas (formerly of Flashpapr and Lovesick), attended the Dick Dale school of guitar. And actually, this has worked for them. It sounded great and was unexpected.
As for The Blow, they put on an awesome show. Well, she put on an awesome show. As Jona Bechtolt (the guy behind all the beats) was off pursuing other musical interests, this duo was reduced to Khaela Maricich performing by herself on stage while someone played her tracks from off stage. Her performance was a very interesting combination of music, anecdotes about her love life/how she writes songs and dance. Khaela writes pop songs like no one else and she used her own experiences to explain to us how she did it. She told us some story about how she and a boy would exchange glances across a room but never did anything about it, and then launched into a song that she wrote about the experience experience. It was an inventive way to keep us all intrigued. And, when I say dance, I mean Khaela couldn’t stop. Imagine a typical hipster white girl trained to break dance via YouTube videos. It was just that extra confidence that really sold her show.