Spiritualized
By Tim Bugbee
Monday. Dec 03, 12:01 AM
live at Museum of Fine Arts (Boston, MA) Nov. 25th, 2007.

Way back in '89, word filtered down that Spacemen 3 were readying their first ever U.S. tour... excitement to see these VU-drenched epics of sparse, chilling, yet uplifting emotion played live at Boston's fabled Rathskellar (aka The Rat) sent my pulse racing, only to have it sent plummeting down to coma levels when they failed to obtain (rumored to be drug offense-related) the necessary working visas and the tour was canceled. I eventually tracked down a poster from this ill-fated tour via eBay just to vicariously project what could have been, but its presence in my house just proved to be an occasional source of heartache. Fast forward 18 years later, and I finally acted on the opportunity to see one of the famed Peter Kember (aka Sonic Boom) / Jason Pierce duo (responsible for a massive chunk of hipster cred, far-reaching influence, and [most importantly] vital records) take the stage and breathe life into the Spacemen 3 songs. Due to prior obligations, I missed Sonic Boom's recent foray into the States a few months ago, but I was certainly not missing the historic Acoustic Mainlines tour that Jason patched together for an all-too scant fourcity U.S. trek (Boston was a very late add to the San Francisco, L.A., and NYC dates, and was a huge feather in the cap of Museum of Fine Arts music programmer Dan Hirsch to land this gig).

The ensemble recruited for delivering the ecstatic, celebratory readings of the Spacemen 3 / Spiritualized songs was immaculately crafted and executed: instead of a blissed-out electric group blasting your neurons into serotonin overload, we got the velvet glove: a perfect match of string quartet, a double brace of gospel singers, and Tony Foster (aka Doggen, Spiritualized guitar player) manning the electronic piano and harmonica, leaving Jason to spill his soul into the glorious lyrics of the songbook while playing an acoustic guitar. After acknowledging the birthday well wishes from the audience, a smiling Jason took his seat and started the night off with a new song "Sitting on Fire," and the mood was set. No harrowing drug tales, no thuggish two chord vamping ad infinitum like some of the prime, early Spacemen 3 – where you thought they'd end up in a pool of sweat and three of six strings still strung – no, this was spiritual music of a very high order, and the audience similarly rejoiced in its reading. At the second song ("Lord Let it Rain) it became clear that the heavenly backing vocals that Jason had envisioned when writing and recording the song were being delivered per design in this live setting. As mentioned previously, I've never seen Spiritualized play before, but it'd be hard to imagine that the pieces would fit so snugly on stage as they did on this night.

Some early gems were polished off and presented to the attentive, sold out room. Of course, "Walking With Jesus" would be a harsh omission with the angelic chorus available, and it was great to hear this done right and proper; "Amen" (originally titled "Hey Man" from the Spacemen 3 debut Sound of Confusion) was similarly given the full gospel treatment and shined brightly; early Spiritualized songs like "Feel So Sad" and "Shine a Light" went straight to the upper ventricle and tear duct. Cautionary tales of opiate-based danger such as "Come Together" and "Cop Shoot Cop" weren't played but the sentiment still was brought forward via "I Think I'm in Love" and especially "Broken Heart," a composition perfectly matched for the minor key string quartet.

If you think I'm unduly dwelling on the downer vibes, don't fret as it wasn't all that, and certainly didn't end that way. The Baptist hymn "Oh Happy Day" encore closer was a glorious call toward a higher being (and this was the moment where the gospel singers made the neck hairs stand at attention), one which Jason's hinted all throughout his career. I'm not a religious man, but damned if I didn't have a spring to my step as I left the auditorium.

Simple Kid (aka Ciaran McFeely of Cork City, Ireland) had the solo singer/acoustic guitar setup, but did a whole lot more with the format than some half-assed Dylan or Neil impersonation. Aside from using visuals to punctuate his Myspace page (predictable) and Kermit the Frog duet (unpredictable), he did a fairly neat lyrical sing-a-long with the words highlighted behind him, and more importantly had some real songs crafted. “Celebrities Go Home” is a sentiment I can always endorse. Envision a Beck without the electronic claptrap. Check him out, he's worth the time.
www.spiritualized.com
www.simplekid.com

Tim Bugbee

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