Live Review: Broken Bells, The Morning Benders, Philadelphia, PA, June 6, 2010

The Morning Benders‘ sound is almost as sweet as their stage presence. This quartet blends dreamy vocals and beach-y percussion, grounded with funk-rock bass lines. At times, the vocals and island rhythms, like on the track “Promises,” sound like a fresh and innocent Vampire Weekend or even a rocking, not-quite-so-sleepy Beach House. These guys captured the crowd with Beach Boy-esque “ooo-aaa” background vocals and ‘50s chord progression, like on “Excuses” from their debut album Big Echo. Broken Bells can thank the Morning Benders for really warming up the Sunday-night audience. Frontman Christopher Chu singled out a fan wearing a Big Echo T-shirt and asked him which song he’d like to hear between “Mason Jar” and “Hand Me Downs.” The fan decided on “Mason Jar,” and that’s what the band played to an approving audience.

There needs to be some kind of appeasement or sacrifice made to whatever cosmic force brought the Shins’ James Mercer and DJ/producer Brian Burton (a.k.a. Danger Mouse) together. This collaboration, whose self-titled debut album sold nearly 50,000 copies in its first week in stores, is simply a perfect pairing of two solidly talented artists. Interestingly, the background animation that played throughout the show gave some insight into Broken Bells’ sound: Half the images were nature close-ups (a bubbling stream or sunset) and alternately scientific-looking items (rulers, orbiting geometric shapes) on graph paper. Mercer has this “lonely cowboy” thing going for him. His voice, lyrics and twangy-rock sound bring about images of a vast desert or speeding past a mountain range. Burton brings a calculated, almost scientific aspect to the music with catchy dance beats.

They opened with their radio hit “October,” which immediately got the audience swaying and singing along. While on the album Mercer handles vocals, guitars and bass and Burton plays organ, drums, piano, synths and bass, live they also had help from guitarist Dan Elkan, bassist Jonathan Hischke, keyboardist/trumpeter Nate Walcott and guitarist/keyboardist Nik Freitas. It was incredible to watch Burton seamlessly jump from organ to drums to piano to bass, and the six-piece band played a really tight set from start to finish. Each song off the album was performed with perfection, and they threw in two crowd-pleasing covers: Tommy James’ “Crimson And Clover” and Smokey Robinson’s “You Really Got A Hold On Me.”

What makes this album great is that each song has a certain amount of diversity within itself: using the synth to create a waltz, the trumpet to give songs a regal feel and the piano to create an “Entertainer” old-timey sound. On the clap-along “The Ghost Inside,” the trumpet brings a Southwestern sound to an otherwise guitar-fueled rock song. The last song before the encore was Broken Bells’ first single “The High Road,” which blends electronic sounds and Mercer’s desperate vocals to create a modern cowboy’s anthem so catchy you can’t help but sing along.

Mercer thanked the crowd for coming out to support the band on a Sunday night. The amount of orange Flyers T-shirts in the crowd was a good marker of the effect Broken Bells has had on fans. A note to Mercer and Burton: If Philadelphians are willing to forgo an important playoff game to see your band, you should probably continue making music together because you’ve got a great thing going.

—Cristina Perachio