She & Him / Dum Dum Girls

So two Thursdays ago, She & Him and the Dum Dum Girls played the final show of the Twilight Concert Series here in Salt Lake. And it was fitting as the final show. Even after big names like New Pornographers, Modest Mouse, and Beirut all summer, nothing could stop everyone from being excited to see the lovely Zooey Deschanel. But.... that was the problem.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. First was the Dum Dum Girls.

I actually enjoyed them. And their outlandish outfits. The Asian drummer tried a little too hard to be sexy, and the singer was a little awkward, but they played well and sounded good. And they were actually the first band I've ever seen to drink straight liquor on stage. Kinda sweet, I guess.

But the audience did not want to have it. All they could talk about was Zooey Deschanel, unaware of the fact that there was another mentionable member of the band. They were yelling things like "Wrap it up!" at the Dum Dum Girls. Finally Ryan got fed up and asked the bro behind us, "Have you ever heard of this guy named M. Ward?" He received, of course, a resounding no. And they continued to be the most obnoxious people I've ever stood next to at a concert. If you can believe it though, it did get worse.

In about the middle of She & Him's set, the duo did a beautiful cover of "Wouldn't It Be Nice" with Zooey on a ukelele, and it was wonderful. One of my favorite songs! It would have been this really powerful, positive moment. But some jerks behind us were screaming and swearing at the stage; I don't even know what they were yelling about, but it was awfully rude, and it completely ruined the video recording I was trying to take of the song. I would post it here, but thecnically, photos/video weren't allowed at the show and I might get in trouble. I guess I'm posting photos, but videos seem worse than my shitty iPhone pictures. But what's funny is that at every one of the other Twilight shows, photos/video were allowed. The famous have to be protected or something? Who knows.

Nonetheless, it was a beautiful set, even if the rest of Salt Lake City disagrees. Reviews complained that it was boring and too long, but I thought it was perfectly balanced and a great ending to the summer concert series. I love their music because despite its sometimes gloomy and heartbroken lyrics, there's a great positivity to it. Zooey's voice even blew me away at times; I hear that she's come really far in her performing. And I'm just really happy I got the chance to see them. For free!

And my apologies that the blog isn't in great working condition yet. I'll make it better, promise. Just a few more kinks to work out, but I'm mostly pretty happy with it :)