Of course I want to see Barenaked Ladies. If there are Barenaked Ladies onstage, I am going to want to be there. Who wouldn’t want to see Barenaked Ladies, right?
OK, I will stop now. But look, I didn’t name the band. (Legend has it they considered and rejected Barenaked Men.) Also, how can I pass this up? I mean, as a journalist, I write a lot of stories with awful adult words like “derivative” and “capitulation” and even “disambiguate.” Imagine the tingling feeling here!
Plus, I really did see Barenaked Ladies. (Tee hee.)
This was at Merriweather about a decade back, after the Canadian pop geniuses had reached their commercial peak and before they fired the drug-addled lead singer. That’s the kind of thing that happens: Commercial peak morphs right into drug-addled lead singer. Pretty much a rock-and-roll cliché.
Ironic, in a sense, since Barenaked Ladies (tee hee) are very much about subverting the cliches. They write hyper-intelligent lyrics laced with clever verbal play and driven by complex musical something something…sorry. That kind of ran out of steam. But the point is, they aren’t your average pop band. Kinda brainy, a little ironic. You can see why I was attracted, n’est pas?
Nor was this an average venue. Merriweather is…bucolic? Yes. Woodsy even. We had seats in the amphitheater, where the grown-ups sit, thank you very much. I’ve sat on the lawn at Merriweather and it’s fine. Spend a lot of time watching the jumbotron instead of the band, which gets a little bit teensy at that range, but the payoff is sunshine and a fairly mellow air of people just laying around grooving to the tunes. So that’s OK if your back can take it and if you bring a blanket.
I prefer the grown-up seats and we had good ones, a dozen rows back, just to the right of center. The (not yet drug-addled) lead singer was wearing eye glitter and we could actually see it shimmer. The house manager asked to sit in on drums for The Old Apartment, a marvelous angry song you must YouTube right now. I will wait.
Back? Good. How cool is that song?
Near the very end of the night the cameraman working the jumbotron latched onto a giggly college-age woman who obligingly lifted her shirt. Barenaked ladies at Barenaked Ladies!
Thanks for the memories, Merriweather.
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Merriweather and Ol’ Blue Eyes – Michael Olesker on remembering the beginning of Merriweather and Columbia
Running into the Sun (But I’m Running Behind) – Alan Feiler on musical bragging rights
So Much Music, So Little Time – Amanda Krotki on growing up attending concerts in Columbia
Merriweather on My Mind – Molly Blosse on summer concerts as an escape from reality
Reeling in the Years – Simone Ellin on feeling like an old Steely Dan fan
To share your own stories, please go to www.facebook.com/JMORELiving and let us know who you’ve seen at the concert pavilion.
Follow Merriweather’s announcements and updates at twitter.com/MerriweatherPP
Top photo: Barenaked Ladies plays Merriweather Post Pavilion in Columbia, MD on July 15, 2013 (Courtesy Andy Jones, Flickr)
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