Moonface / Talkdemonic / Tammar @ Bowery Ballroom 10.30.11

Spencer Krug and his impeccable hair

On a Mischief Night more akin to a sleepy Sunday night than the devilish eve before Halloween, Montreal's Moonface lured costumed customers away from the holiday shenanigans to Bowery Ballroom for some nice organ music fun.

Hitting the floor well after Tammar's set, we caught Talkdemonic and became instantly enamored. The Portland, Oregon instrumental duo dropped some weather appropriate electro-folk jams that reminded Snail of I See Rowboats (now sadly disbanded). While the music was enough to reel us in, the band had us completely at their unique stage presence. Witnessing our first viola rock-out courtesy of Lisa Molinaro, we wondered why other bowed string musicians didn't get down like that, too. Drummer Kevin O'Connor kept it classy, boldly jumping from stage to floor weaving through the scantily crowded audience playing a melodica.

Blame it on Sunday, the holiday, or the efficiency of Spencer Krug's unspoken strategy to revert to obscurity with this project (we'll go with the last one), the venue only grew to about half capacity by the time Moonface came on. Dimly lit with a fireplace going in the background, Spencer and his cohort, the amazing Mike Bigelow played a set similar to their previous shows at Envelope and Mercury Lounge with a few exceptions. No "Shit-Hawk in the Snow" left room for an unreleased song Spencer admitted rips off lyrics from Real Life's 80's classic "Send Me an Angel." Quite generously, we were also gifted with a very rare encore with solo Spencer doing a beautiful cover of Fine Young Cannibals' "I'm Not The Man I Used To Be".

Seemingly growing more chatty with every leg of this tour, Mr. Krug not only entertained audience shouts but indulged us with a couple of silly anecdotes. First he recounted their plan to dress up like Jim Morrison and a member of The Blue Man Grouponly to can the idea because they'd be too busy dying of laughter to play. Later, we learned about his first run in with American police on a highway all due to a driver taking a joke sign, "Mike is stuck in a Haagen Daz container, Send Help!", on the window back of the mini van too seriously.

Keeping his promise to reinvent Moonface as he goes (he's currently recording material with Finnish band Siinai for the next release), Spencer announced this would be last time we'd hear the contents of Organ Music Not Vibraphone Like I'd Hoped played live. While its bittersweet to think we'd have to wait longer than a couple months to see him live again, after three times, it's easier to say goodbye to the old songs and hello to the next musical reincarnation of Spencer Krug.  --Cheep

Photo by Charles Steinberg via The House List