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The Moldy Peaches at Tulagi in Boulder, CO 3/9/02

When I'm at a Moldy Peaches show, their music makes me feel like they know what young people really go through in life. Not everyone gets dates. Not everyone has cool friends with Paul Frank t-shirts that hang out with them at the lockers in school. The band's two singers are front-runners for "most abused childhood" awards. They're quirky. They're irreverent. Their show didn't bring anything less to the table.

The band opened the show with "Lazy Confessions" and went into "Nothing Came Out." This song showed a gentle, sweeter side of the Moldy Peaches. Unrequited love strikes a chord in every person in the audience as the female singer comes down on herself calling herself a "huge manatee" as she's singing to Jack, the electric guitarist. It's all in fun, but like they say, "There's no such thing as a harmless joke." Critics say that there is no more humility in the music world today but if you ever are having a bad day and want to feel about 60% better, put this album on your player and help yourself to some of the most raw theatrics found in music today.

The Moldy Peaches played two new songs, "County Fair" and "Rainbows." I love bands that aren't afraid to talk about turds, rollerskates, and cartoons without taking themselves too seriously. Then, my prayers were answered when they played "Jorge Regula." If anyone needs extra incentive to see this band in concert, I'll say this: they have songs called "Downloading Porn With Davo" and "Who's Got the Crack." You'll have to figure out the meaning to those titles on your own but this low-fi, DIY style music is the best thing to hit my ears since since I found out how to listen to both Ween and Beat Happening at the same time.

If you haven't heard of the Moldy Peaches by this point, stop watching MTV2 and listening to some cheeseball modern rock station with a repeating format and buy this band's self-titled debut. My friend calls it recess-rock for schizophrenic kids because it takes her back to jean jackets and those shoes with the zipper on the sides for ice cream money. I think those shoes are key if you are all about trying to avoid the bully in your class who takes your money. That's something the Moldy Peaches can appreciate because they're from NYC and definitely had rough-necks confronting them. Nothing's changed. There are still critics of bands who try to do something different.

There aren't a lot of shows that I go to where I don't wonder what time it is, at least once, throughout the set. This is one of those bands that captivate me the entire time, all the way to the closing song, "i forgot" whose ironic satire is a quest to question our reality without being pretentious. This band doesn't have to give out adderol to the crowd to keep them intrigued. The Moldy Peaches keep the audience entertained the entire time, and the crowd has reacted accordingly at every show I've seen. When I saw them open for the Strokes, a few audience members were even a little upset that the Moldy Peaches set was over.

This band is grittingly honest and there is nothing else to say except that playing an all-ages show, letting me get home by eleven o'clock is the way to go!

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