Parquet Courts
Mohawk, March 15
In music, everything’s cyclical, and the smart guys revive more than one thing at a time. So it was with Brooklyn’s Parquet Courts, which deftly combine the Reagan-era jangle psych of the Feelies with the Clinton-era slacker punk of Archers of Loaf. A walking advertisement for Fender guitars, the quartet almost can’t help the sound of summer strumming, particularly with the way Andrew Savage and Austin Brown bounce complementary chord work off each other. Bassist Sean Yeaton kept the rhythms burning and tunes racing, which is a good thing given the pickers’ casual attitudes toward vocal harmony. Despite never smiling, and looking like a bunch of college kids after an all-night cram session, the former Texans’ performance still popped, especially when Savage strangled his guitar to coax noisier sounds out of his amp. The energy rush was enhanced by songs like the intricately picked “N Dakota,” poptastic “Borrowed Time,” and the punked-up “Yonder Is Closer to the Heart.” The audience, packed into the Mohawk’s indoor room like Oreos in an un-air-conditioned cookie jar, responded with spontaneous, if musically inappropriate, mosh pits – another throwback to the Nineties.
This article appears in March 22 • 2013.
