Review: The Electric Owls @ Lexington Avenue Brewery’s new performance space

A review of the Lexington Avenue Brewery’s new performance space and last weekend’s show there by Electric Owls and Cobra Horse. Review by Chall Gray:

Saturday night at the Lexington Avenue Brewery’s performance space yielded several pleasant surprises, foremost of which was the stunning show by Electric Owls — who are, in this reviewers opinion, the best band in Asheville that you probably haven’t seen play.

But this review is meant to address not just the show the evening’s performances, but the new music venue in the LAB, so we’ll get to the bands in a moment. The performance venue — which has a stated capacity of only 99 — is well appointed, with its own bar, and a long row of raised seating against one wall. One wall is stone, which is tastefully downlit, giving the room a bit of a dungeon feel that only dissipates after a decent size crowd has amassed. Until the music began I thought of the raised seating area, which offered a great view of the stage, as the venue’s best feature, but the sound was better. 

Since the venue is owned by the proprietors of Echo Mountain Studios, I admit that my expectations were fairly high coming in. Were it not owned by such experienced audio experts, this reviewer might have felt more trepidation about a consideration of the space so soon. But they obviously but a great deal of thought and energy into the acoustics of the space. There is a considerable amount of sound damping material subtly placed throughout the room (chiefly on the ceiling), and the sound system is top notch. The space would seem given to echo, but that seemed to have been almost completely neutralized by these measures. 

Electric Owls took the stage somewhat later than the posted start time of the show, and immediately took charge of the evening. Despite being in existence for almost two years now, Electric Owls have kept a pretty low profile since being formed by lead singer Andy Herod. Their debut CD Ain’t Too Bright was released in April of last year on Vagrant, and they have toured to promote it, but have played less than a half-dozen shows here in Asheville, according to Herod. The CD is definitely worth having (samples can be heard on their MySpace page), but their live show is even better. The arrangements are more intricate — almost every song on Saturday night featured a lap slide, which is absent from the the record — and have a very fun, expansive feel to them. Often starting slow, the songs would steadily, in a way reminiscent of The National’s better songs (although Andy Herod and Matt Berninger’s vocal stylings couldn’t be more different). The vocal arrangements were also a pleasant surprise, often three part harmonies from Herod, the bassist, and the lead guitarist, whose falsetto was often the perfect compliment. Their set was thoroughly good — a fact that did not escape the crowd, whose spirited applause was a constant in between each song — and one of the strongest from a local band I can recall seeing in a long time. Next time you see Electric Owls listed for a gig, don’t miss it! 

After a short break Cobra Horse began their set, a noticeable contrast in energy. Musically, Cobra Horse has obvious influences in The Ramones, The Stooges, and any number of other great punk bands, and singer/guitarist Josh Carpenter proved more than capable with his guitar solos on the first few songs. Instrumentally, their set was raucous, high-energy, and exciting–marked by propulsive drumming, snarling guitars and a solid bass line. The problem though, was that Carpenter’s voice was higher than Iggy Pop or Joey Ramone, and it never seemed able to gain any purchase over their raucous instrumentation. Some of this could be due to the LAB’s sound man not being used to the space, or to getting good levels with such a loud group in a small space (never an easy task), but, whatever the reasons, the quality of the set never quite made it to what it was so obvious these talented musicians were capable of. Even their final number, a spirited cover of Tom Petty’s “Refugee,” didn’t quite get to where we knew the band could take it.

In sum, with the opening of the LAB’s performance space the music scene is this town has gained a fantastic asset, and there is no doubt that it will yield many great shows in the years to come, and they could not have picked a more apposite band to open with than Electric Owls.

Chall Gray is a freelance writer and producer who lives in Asheville.