REVIEW: AVI BUFFALO AT BRISTOL THEKLA (11/07/11)
Avi Buffalo don’t look like your average rock band. They’re a motley bunch of Californians fronted by a charismatic dude who wouldn’t be out of place in a US teen show, they’ve got a tomboy on drums and another on bass and a serious lookin fella called George on rhythm guitar. When front man Avi opens his mouth a high pitched, potentially whiney sound comes out. It could be annoying, but thankfully it’s not. But only just. Although when he does a jokey, gruff Tom Waits voice during new song Julian Rios it proves one of the highlights of the show.
Support came from Tripwires and Admiral Fallow. Admiral Fallow follow the tried and tested route of many Scottish indie bands of having those tender, heavily accented vocals expelled by a shy, bearded fella a la Pictish Trail, with accompanying music by some painfully twee indie folk including a female flautist. Tis the sound of the Highlands don’t you know.
Avi Buffalo, who put in a stellar performance at last year’s Green Man festival, open with How Come (we know this because they are courteous enough to tell us the names of their new songs before they play them, though there’s an air of them making it up on the spot about it). They promise to play the B-side later. But before that we’re treated to a series of songs brimming with substance. Five Little Sluts, Won’t Be Round No More and Jessica.
Their sound is pretty versatile and sits somewhere between grunge heroes Pavement and modern day Seattle band Fences. In fact, they’re signed to Seattle label Sub Pop so this kinda makes sense. Saying that, there are definite sniffs of some of the mellower fare of bands during parts of the set, such as Wilco. And at their best (and most tense) his vocals have a beautiful Neil Young air about them while his lyrics scream Bright Eyes. Avigdor (real name) comes across as very down to earth as he interacts with the crowd and this helps us feel the emotion when he spits out lyrics like ‘You know I’m kidding but sometimes, I feel like you’re all I’ve got’, you can’t help but nodding in agreement.
Where Avi Buffalo really excel though is in their layered Americana tinged songs, such as What’s In It For? Where they carve that larger Fleet Foxes esque grandeur but maintaining the edgier guitar sound. With so many different influences notable in one relatively short set you could be forgiven for thinking Avi Buffalo lack direction, and at times during the set I wondered that myself, but my mood hardly matched the vibe of this gig so I’d say give them a whirl and decide for yourself.
Words and photo: Laura Williams
