The Beat Surrender

Many books have been written about fame, but it never ceases to amaze how a long-suffering band can achieve overnight success status. No Cities Left, The Dears fantastic album originally released in 1993, is the definition of a slow burn. Great word of mouth (as well as a couple of video airings on MTV) have turned the Montreal outfit into yet another great band coming from the Great White North, along with The Stills and The Arcade Fire. On a slow Sunday night, The Dears took the stage at Boston’s Paradise to keep the fast moving ball of momentum building.

But before that occurred, opener Shout Out Louds, really impressed with their folk-pop musical stylings. What is with Swedish groups making rock revival records better than their U.S. counterparts? The Raveonettes, The Hives, and Soundtrack of Our Lives are head and shoulders above the from the likes of Louis XIV. My theory is that they hold a higher reverence for the source material, and as such add their own element to it as opposed to rip it off note for note (the Hives excluded). What is criminal is that Louis XIV will receive twice as much pub as SOL and they don’t have half as much talent.

The Dears brought the big show atmosphere to the mid-sized club, with the festival lighting and camera crew (assumingly for a future tour DVD). They dispensed with any anticipation for the single-heads and dropped “Lost in the Plot� the second song in. Murray Lightburn and company have waited too long in their career to be overshadowed by a minor radio hit. If they have any resentment towards the song, they certainly didn’t show it.

I was surprised by the amount of rawk the band supplied, especially by drummer George Donoso. His healthy diet of fills throughout the night kept the entire set on edge, an aspect of the music that isn’t front and center on the records. And is there anything more rock n’ roll than the silhouette of a crazy drummer through a strobe light against a stark white backdrop?

Another element that was more pronounced live than on record is the various harmonizing between the band members. The vocal combinations of Murray, Natalie[Yanchak, keyboards], and Valerie [Jodoin-Keaton, keyboards], especially on “22:The Death of All The Romance� where Murray sung with the passion of a man whose heart was being broken on stage, kept the emotional intensity of the night at the forefront.

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