fun. rehearsed for 5 days at Paisley Park, Prince's home-studio, we were told, then played what vocalist Nate Reuss said was "the biggest hall we've ever played in our lives." That would be the Roy Wilkins Auditorium in St. Paul, MN, on Wednesday night, January 23, 2013.
And they were, well, fun.
And seeing them live, the paradox was resolved.
fun. opened the proceedings with "Out on the Town," which I happen to think is their best song, and "One Foot," both from the current LP Some Nights; "All the Pretty Girls," a great song from Aim and Ignite; and "Why Am I the One," also from Some Nights. This was all arena-pop at its very best. Simple, direct. You could hear and understand the vocals. You could sing along, easily, and the crowd sang along, loudly.
Then came the most perfect fun. song title, if not song: "At Least I'm Not As Sad (As I Used to Be"! This is fun?
The show lagged a bit through the middle sections, frankly. Many of their songs are mid-tempo and slower, but more than that Reuss' voice started getting lost in the mix. At his best, at their best, they are a vocal band, the music is supportive, almost incidental. And he came through loud and clear in the early going. But these songs give Reuss a workout, and maybe his voice got tired. The vocal chord is a muscle, and muscles get tired from strenous use. Or maybe the band got a little louder as time went by.
But this is hair-splitting. In the end, fun. came back to its strongest material and closed strong with "All Alright," then "Some Nights" and "Stars" as an encore.
And don't get me wrong about the music. It was solid. Andrew Dost stepped forward and played some engaging piano leads, while Jack Antonoff did the same with some occasional Van Halen guitar. But the music was background, accompaniment, meant to show off the vocals, and that's what they do.
Multi-instrumentalist Emily Moore stood out on the occasional vocal duet and on saxophone on "One Foot," but mostly contributed guitar and keyboards. As you know, fun. likes the drums far forward in the mix; now and again on Some Nights it sounds like there's an army of drummers. Will Noon successfully played the whole damn army. Bassist Nate Harold, well, played bass. I can't ever remember actually noticing what he was doing.
fun. promises their fans fun music, a fun time. And they deliver with bright, cheery, upbeat, energetic music, and they delivered Wednesday night with a bright, cheery, upbeat, energetic show. Their fans, who filled the 5,000 seat auditorium to the rafters--and you can trust me on this, because I was in the rafters--seemed to have a good time. (Understatement alert.)
But, then there's their lyrics. There's enough angst there to stop a fan in his or her tracks. This feeling that they sing about, I've had it, and it ain't fun. "Why am I the one/Always packing up my stuff?" Why don't my relationships last? "There's nothing left inside of my chest/But it's all alright." That's alright? Whoa. "There's no one to keep me warm." I'm starting to see a pattern here.
But seeing them live, it came to me. "We Are Young," they sang. Of course they're uncertain. Of course they don't know what they want. They don't know whether they've done right, whether they're on the path to happiness, or not. They're young. But they're not gonna let it get them down. They're still gonna manage to have, well, fun. They're gonna be "all alright."
Wednesday night they were better than all right. They were terrific. I can easily imagine that many in the crowd, which probably averaged under 20 years of age and ranged down to 6 and 7 years of age, thought this was the best concert they'd ever seen. A fun. time.
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