Pacific Northwest duo Ken Stringfellow and Jon Auer have performed together as the Posies for nearly 30 years. In that time they’ve become masters of power pop, producing guitar jangle, sugary melodies, and impeccable harmonies. Their current tour picks venues where music isn’t normally on the menu and performances aren’t unannounced until day of show.
Austin’s Roosevelt Room is a lovely bar, an establishment where people can feel swanky while drinking traditional and non-traditional alcoholic drinks. It was merely okay as a space for music. The long, narrow room made it less than ideal for the sound to carry to the back, and the Posies seemed to act as their own sound men from the stage.
Auer manned guitar, Stringfellow handled both guitar and keys, and Frankie Siragusa beat the drum. The sound mix seemed relatively simple, but they never got it quite right. That proved a disappointment for those who haven’t seen the band play a proper show in Austin since 2010.
Touring a new album due at the end of the month, Solid States, the live trio amplified its sonic departure of relying more on synthesizers and odd, even psychedelic textures. Some of material’s nuance was lost onstage, but that still left the Posies in all their six-string glory on new tunes “We R Power,” “Unlikely Places,” and “Squirrel vs. Snake.” On all, the trademark Stringfellow and Auer harmonies soared.
Midset, Amy Nelson, member of Folk Uke and daughter to Willie, joined in efficiently for the twists and turns of “The Glitter Prize,” a song from 2010’s Blood/Candy that features Kay Hanley from Letters to Cleo on disc. Closer “Solar Sister” from their major opus, 1993’s Frosting the Beater, featured a fuzzy guitar freak-out by Auer that contrasted the song’s pure pop. It peaked the excitement level, certainly.
As Stringfellow warned before the band played a note, the show was a “classy clusterfuck.” It was messy, almost rehearsal-like, and the sound was a disappointment. Loud audience chatter doesn’t lie. Die-hards were left hoping for a proper Posies show and hoping it happens in less time than the six years between this one and the last one at La Zona Rosa.
This article appears in April 29 • 2016.