I hate driving in San Francisco. We, as an intelligent collective of organisms, need to hurry up and invent teleportation, because going to the city and trying to find parking is just mind boggling. That place is not meant for automotive transportation. When we finally did find parking it was because a limo had been rendered immobile, and only our compact car could traverse around it. The limo had gotten its mid section stuck at the crest of a hill and was teetering like a very, very classy see-saw. After we found a spot we made our descent to Columbus Ave, where the venue was located. Given the name (Bimbo’s 365), I expected to walk into a dive bar with crusty patrons, sighing at the influx of foreigners to see some clangy band in their haunt. I was surprised to enter a classy night club (whose capacity approaches 700), complete with bathroom attendants and a coat check. At the entrance were the merchandise tables for the two bands that were performing: Shilpa Ray And Her Happy Hookers were opening for Man Man. I’m not familiar with the opening act, but I have been a fan of Man Man for quite some time. This will be the first time that I have seen them as a headlining act (as opposed to an act at a large-scale music festival), where I have read that they are more free to give in to their own whimsy.

Shilpa Ray took the stage with a drum intro reminiscent of “Sing, Sing, Sing.” The four-piece was led by a frail twenty-something dark-skinned woman playing a harmonium while alternating between singing, shouting, and whispering. I am still completely confounded by her ability to go from a primal guttural scream immediately into a sweet sounding alto melody. The opening song, “Stick It To The Woman” was a perfect introduction to their sound as it encapsulated all the dynamics and styles of the songs that followed. The band spans many genres (I would define them as 80’s Themed Doo-Wop-Revival Grunge), as does the song: the swinging drum beat continues as the vocals sing long drawn out forlorn melodies until the band seamlessly begins a I-iv-V-VI progression (“Earth Angel,” anyone?) and then charges head on into a noise collage with Gospel shouts and screams.

I was floored.

The next song was “Natural Selection,” a bouncy, doo-woppy, piece featuring a call and response chorus. You don’t realize what you’re dancing to unless you stop to listen to the call and response:

First you get a tumor (First you get a tumor)
Then you get the cancer (THEN you get the cancer)
Then you get the chemo, but you never get the cure.

Combining sad lyrics with a peppy song is nothing new, but they have raised that concept to the Nth degree with this song. I am now beginning to understand why these bands are playing together. They both fit into the same strange genre niches, and they both sing lyrics that imply that they are celebrating their own demise. A curiosity about these doo-wop undertones was building inside me. I’ve noticed in a lot of new indie bands that that old format was a recurring theme. But as the rest of the band left the stage, with only Shilpa Ray and her harmonium, I decided that this act was purposeful and that these bands were modeling themselves after an older style of music, trying to bring that sensibility into a new age. I made this realization because Shilpa, frail, sallow-eyed, and looking strung out, began to play Etta James’ “I’d Rather Go Blind” (another point of similarity— Man Man has covered this song). If I have not pressed this point enough, allow me to do so further. The sounds this woman made… Picture a water hose that has been turned on but plugged up, building pressure until it suddenly releases with a tremendous force. The hose is her body, the water her voice, and it is all just as refreshing as it sounds. I may or may not be in love.

MTV has a branch called MTV Desi. The word “desi” is derived from Sanskrit and means “one of our country,” in reference to South Asia- India, Bangladesh, Pakistan. Shilpa Ray and her Happy Hookers (though they are ¾ Caucasian) have been featured on that website, and I strongly urge you to check out those performances.

Man Man took quite a while to get on the stage after they had set up. Back where the drums should be was that big mystery machine they operate, to the left of that was another instrument station with a saxophone, a flute, a bass guitar, and vibraphone/xylophone type of instrument. On the other side was another set of vibraphones, a trumpet set up in a vise and parked in front of a mic, an electric and an acoustic guitar. At the front of the stage was a Roland electric piano in a hand-built harness decorated with various knick-knacks: doll parts, assorted small percussion instruments according bells and chimes, and a Furby hanging down from a clip. Next to the piano was a floor tom. This rig was set facing to the right, perpendicular to the audience. The drumset was facing the electric piano, so those two performers would be looking each other in the face the whole time. It was a toy kit, and decorated with brightly colored zig zags around the wood. An orange tool box containing various hand percussion was set to the side of the kit, and more instruments— beads, sea shells on a string, jingle bells, etc, were draped from strategic places on the kit. A roadie brought out a huge ladder and after brief discussion with another roadie set it up at the back of the stage near the synth set up. The stage was also decorated with Christmas lights and a television set that broadcast a loop of a close up of the synth operator’s face looking slightly pained and extremely awkward. A group of people in black shirts that said ROADIE on the back and MAN MAN WORLD TOUR ‘84 did all the set-up and (SPOILER ALERT) they turned out to be the members of the band incognito.

They returned to the stage all wearing white pants and dark coats, with white war paint on their faces. They opened with a haunting song in c-minor, “Feathers.” The audience screamed along. The next song was “Mr. Jung Stuffed,” an up-beat dance number whose performance requires one of the members to beat on a defunct fire-extinguisher with a wrench and brushes. Man Man keeps things pretty theatrical, with synchronized leaps into the air between the frontman and the drummer. There were also several costume changes for the frontman, Honus Honus. Before “Haute Tropique,” he donned a bowler cap (borrowed from an audience member), a glittering, low sweeping overcoat who pockets were stuffed with shredded newspaper that he presented to the audience mid song, and then threw at us with the line “If you wanna steal, then steal what you want.” This was probably the darkest moment on stage that evening, as he acted out the song’s self-deprecating introspection by slapping himself in the face while he sang, mimicked hanging himself with a neck-tie and generally writhed around with the mic-stand.

The majority of the show was full of twisted vaudevillian theatrics like that. He set off a confetti cannon, blew a fistful of red feathers at the audience, and ended the show by running to that ladder backstage during a density drop in the last song, climbing up with a large bell, holding it out above the trumpet mic and striking it once to produce a comically meager tone. 

I’m not so sure these people didn’t come to hear music so much as they came to be physically close to a group of musicians that they have developed an emotional connection with. Both times I’ve seen Man Man there was a rush to the stage. Our bodies were made compact as the people behind pushed to get closer, closer, closer, elbows mashing into ribs, bellies touching spines, and feet vying for real estate, all amidst a perpetual sway back and forth. As strange and non-sensical as this band’s lyrics are, people identify. A lot of the songs are less about specific events, but about specific feelings— a collage of words painting the image of heart-ache and brain-rending guilt. Still others are about grimy voodoo and black magic a la Tom Waits. I know that the albums “Six Demon Bag” and “Rabbit Habits” are practically printed on the inside of my skull; I know them back and forth, from moments of unashamed depravity to limping woe-is-me. They have a new album, Life Fantastic, and I’m still getting acclimated to it. It may be because it has such a polished sound; if you take each Man Man album and listen to them chronologically you can hear the production value improve with each installment, and this album is clearly the pinnacle of that sonic aspect. It’s a great album, but it leaves me craving more. And, God, I can’t wait to hear what’s next.

Photo by Sandlin Gaither via Man Man’s Myspace Page.