The Doug Fir Lounge is too small a venue for a band like the Go! Team. Their "sugar-packed beats" incite massive amounts of ass shaking and hyperactivity. I've never shaken my ass in this or, I'm pretty sure, any previous lifetime but the band's music had a crowd of a few hundred people bouncing all over the place on Wednesday night. At one point, someone up front started swinging what looked like a jump rope over the heads of everyone around them. Why? Because they were listening to the Go! Team. That's what their music does to people.

The Doug Fir's small stage barely had enough room for all 3,000 (ok, maybe six) members of the Go! Team and limited lead singer "Ninja"'s ability to throw down Jazzercise kicks at every available opportunity. The band did what they could with the space though. The guitarists still had enough room to repeatedly perform a near head-butt dive from opposite ends of the stage while Ninja did her best Tina Turner circa "Proud Mary" impression.

It was a great set covering tracks from the band's two albums and they even played "Everyone's a V.I.P. to Someone Else," my favorite song that combines what sounds like samples from a '70s Hamm's beer commercial with a forgotten Disneyland ride soundtrack. My ears are still ringing four days later. Sadly though, they didn't bring along the film projector used during a show two years ago at the Wonder Ballroom.

A band from LA called Bodies of Water opened. Their frontwoman looks like Ramona Quimby all grown up and she howls like a clone mutant slapped together with DNA stolen from Karen O and Bjork. Their music falls somewhere between the Yeah, Yeah Yeahs and Jefferson Airplane. Definitely worth tracking down.

More thoughts on the Doug Fir Lounge/Jupiter Hotel can be found here. The "Comedians of Comedy" weren't too pleased with the place when they stayed there recently.

Labels: hipster hotels, music