built to spill at southgate house

On Friday night we drove to Newport, KY, to see Built to Spill at the Southgate House. Newport is right across from Cincinnati on the Ohio River. To get there, we had to cross a bridge into Ohio, then cross another bridge back into Kentucky. After living in the West for the past nine years, I kind of forgot how quickly you can cross state lines like that on this side of the country.

A little about the Southgate House: it's the former home of Richard Southgate, a lawyer, Kentucky state representative, senator, and silk manufacturer. The house was built in 1814 by British prisoners of war from the War of 1812. Before it became a live music venue, it hosted visitors like Abraham Lincoln and the volunteer company led by Captain Sidney Sherman, who went on to join Sam Houston and the Texas army to defeat Santa Anna at the Battle of San Jacinto during the Texas Revolution. Also, the guy who invented the Thompson submachine gun, John T. Thompson, was born there in 1860.

Looks like Halloween came a little early this year, hmm? You wouldn’t think that this place was a music venue or nightclub just by looking it, but I’d say that the ballroom in the back of the house is similar in size to the main stage at Bricks (or whatever it’s called now) in Salt Lake City or the 9:30 Club in DC.

We got there early enough to grab a spot on the floor near the stage, but we’re a couple of old geezers who have done our fair share of rubbing up against the sweaty, head-bobbing masses during our college years, so we decided to park ourselves in a couple of chairs on the balcony.

Opening for Built to Spill was a band called Disco Doom. They are from Switzerland, a magical land filled with delicious chocolate, Roger Federer, and a functioning health care system. I like them a lot and they played a great set. Sort of reminds me of a hybrid of Pavement and Broken Social Scene, and their front woman totally rocked the omnichord! Their stuff is pretty hard to come by (we were lucky enough to purchase their full-length and EP at the show), but they do have a few songs up on their MySpace page—a couple of my favorites are "White Gun Cold Jet" and "The Great Disaster."

Just counting the past five years, we’ve seen Built to Spill twice in SLC, once in DC, twice in LA, once in Long Beach, and now once in Newport. Obviously, I think that seeing them in concert will never get old. It's still hard to believe that more people haven't heard of them considering the fact that they've been on a major label since 1997 and several commercially successful bands (Modest Mouse, The Shins, and Death Cab for Cutie, just to name a few) and tons of up-and-coming indies love to name drop them as a major influence. Maybe if they agree to do commercials for package delivery companies or salad dressing . . . yeah, it'll never happen.

Part of what I love about Built to Spill (besides Doug Martsch’s ability to grow an amazing beard) is that they dress like a bunch of unassuming factory workers and have zero interest in being flashy or pandering to the audience—no matching skinny suits, no pyrotechnics, no fancy light show, no talking about how their new album drops next week (I'll do it for them: There Is No Enemy, which can be streamed in its entirety on their MySpace, is out on October 6). Other than the occasional "thanks for coming out tonight" in between songs, they cut through all the crap and just play great music. At the Newport show, they played one song from their new album ("Hindsight"—awesome) and the rest was a fantastic mix of tracks from their previous albums, including "Carry the Zero," "In the Morning," "Joyride," "Strange," "Sidewalk," and "Traces." (Alas, no "Cortez the Killer.") Also, I think it’s hard for most bands to pull off two guitars, let alone three, without sounding messy—but Built to Spill probably has the most technically clean sound of just about any band I’ve heard live. And because they will never stop touring, ever, I bet that we’ll probably get a chance to see them again sometime next year.