Adam Green, Freiheizhalle Munich, 02/23/10
Support: Jukebox The Ghost

The world is a peach

It was the perfect setting for an Adam Green gig: the first rays of spring floating through Munich’s streets, it was a little warmer than the weeks before, smelling like happiness and rose blossoms, making people a little more comfortable around each other. That is what Adam Green is made for, refreshing, light-weighted, and a tiny bit insane from feelings.

Jukebox The Ghost are supporting Adam Green throughout his European tour. They are not too well known around here but there is a good chance this will change after the tour. The three guys have an inventive sound that they themselves like to compare with Ben Folds, a comparison I would agree on some level, but maybe a bit more juvenile. The piano in their music is the pedal pusher, the thing that makes simple indie-rock go nuts. The singing parts are shared between guitarist Tommy Siegel and pianist Ben Thornewill, drummer Jesse Kristing impresses with multi tasking, a drum stick in one, a tambourine in the other hand. All in all, when they finished I had a historic moment: I finally found a supporting act I would definitely recommend to others.

It seems there is nothing left unsaid about Adam Green. During the decade of his career he must have stopped here for gigs like a million times, but from the second he was on stage he was anything but predictable, like one big living surprise. Throughout the last year alone he managed to go through a complete metamorphosis and still stay the same in a way. The songs from the new album “Minor Love” define a whole new Adam Green, but the smart, funny lyrics, the entertainment and the weirdo dances stayed the same. As he said after a few songs, talking comes easy to him, and it came in avalanches between the songs. He told us about an incident with a drunk boy from Vienna with blatter control problems, from leprechauns growing fat until they burst and cover the earth with bread crumps, and in between he french-kissed people in the front row and took several rides on the peoples hands. He encouraged people to talk to him, tell him stories too, and he always found a suiting answer to their requests, even if it was just a smile or the F-word, in any way, he made people laugh. He proved once again that he is a very funny boy and talented entertainer. As the poster boy of the Anti-Folk-movement it is a given to give the girls some nudity, and the funny thing is: not only girls were screaming when he took off his clothes.

Adam’s dancing was exhausting even to watch, which might be the reason he sometimes lost his breath during singing. Fortunately he had an attentive background, his band held him up and filled loopholes Adam created there. But when Adam played some of the new songs all by himself and his acoustic guitar he found his flow again. This kind of reduced performance finally gave the audience a chance to really pay attention to his lyrics, which forced some laughs even during he was singing.

The later the evening got, the louder the music grew, and Adam Green pleased the peoples need of sing-along-songs. “Jessica”, “Dance With Me”, “Morning After Midnight” and “Emily” were examples on the setlist to make the people move. Shortly before the show was over, he shared another philosophy with us. “The world is mould. No! The world is a peach, we are the mould!”. Growing up makes even Adam Green pessimistic. The only thing we could do about it was to work against it with the careless fun and sarcasm of an Adam Green show.

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