ManManManManManManManManManMan

Man Man's set at Webster Hall a sort of mock-primal ritualistic front for just banging out some soul music on a good, old-fashioned Fender Rhodes. The band performs in a kind of clump - which I approve of, though main Man Man Honus still sits front and center, though drummer Chris Powell faces him directly, daring the front man to send the drummer to be back of the stage. That's part of what makes Man Man fun on a more cerebral level - the breaking down, or ignoring of, certain boundary lines - instrumental hierarchies (vocals of central importance, then guitars, then drums, then bass) dissolve - the band performs in a mass, the members switch instruments, bang on tire rims, cans, bang on the stage, scream, writhe, and babble. You get the feeling they would play the audience if they could - they're painted up like some generic tribe of somebodies, red and white lines under their eyes for virility, I guess. And given the showiness of it all, it's seems like it would be easy to cry irony and dismiss. But it's not, the frenzied atmosphere on stage, the falling-all-over-the-instruments and jumping, whooping, the seemingly unnecessary double-saxophone honking, it's not ironic at all. It's spontaneous and cathartic and all of the things rock and roll was supposed to be decades before you were born. Except it's not that either, because they're so tight that you come to realize that it's all rehearsed. Which, if that undercuts the ecstasies, well, fine - it's still a hell of a show.