Built to Spill and Fauxbois at Slim's

Joseph Schell

​Built to Spill
Slim's
July 15, 2010
Better than: if Paul McCartney went indie (yup. I went there)

When Doug Martsch sings, it's unclear whether he wants to woo the mic or eat the mic. Either way is fine with his fans -- as long as he's singing, and as long as the band keeps playing. At least that much was clear at last night's sold-out Built to Spill show at Slim's (and when I say sold-out, I mean no-elbow-room kind of sold-out), where fans stuck around yelling for more even after the encore was finished and the lights went up.

Joseph Schell

​Martsch is among the least chatty of indie-rock frontmen, but still manages to rouse his crowd somehow. Last night it seemed like this might be because the majority of his crowd comes to the Boise-based band's shows with a wide repertoire of songs already memorized. As Martsch gyrated against the mic, moving from one distortion pedal to the next, fans at the front of the room watched with dopey smiles, feeding a chorus of encouraging cries that punctuated the breaks between each song.

Joseph Schell

​I have to admit that, at times, Built to Spill edges so close to shoegaze that I find myself tuning out -- like when the band hits minute seven of whatever distortion-heavy song they happen to be stuck on. But what I love about Built to Spill, and especially about its live show, is that just when I start to get bored, the band comes back screaming with some new twist -- whether it's a new beat, a new riff, or an entirely new melody.

The live show is fun in part because the band has such a giant list of songs (from seven full-length albums) to choose from, ranging from short and sweet ("Fly Around My Pretty Little Miss") to long and unpredictable ("Untrustable"). In addition, from my experience last night and the one show I have seen the band play before, Built to Spill's members appear pretty much unphased by whatever is going on in the crowd. Not indifferent -- just unphased. This is a band focused on making music. Which they have proven they can do, both live and in-studio, with flying colors.

Joseph Schell

Fauxbois

​Critic's Notebook:

Personal bias: where to begin. This band pretty much got me through about a decade of existence. So, yeah.

Overheard in the crowd: "Doug! I have a 12-year-old daughter with braces - she named each brace after you: Doug 1, Doug 2..."

By the way: Openers Fauxbois, also of Boise, started out sounding way to much like their headliners/neighbors, but I definitely warmed up to the band by the end of its set -- when it played some stuff that had a sound all of its own.