Chilly, chilly is the evening time

Saturday was likely a slow night in the Irish bars of the City, as it is every time the Frames are in town. I shook off some minor cold symptoms and met up with the freshly returned Mexican Submariners and some other old friends at the Fillmore, ready to cheer on the bands despite an inability to raise my own voice in approval.

We arrived precisely at showtime and were somewhat surprised to hear Los Angeles-based duo the Submarines covering "Waterloo Sunset" for what may very well have been the first song of their set. I don't know why in the world anyone would take the stage by covering "Waterloo Sunset," and their version was pleasant enough, but my goodness, I wish they'd done something else for a set-starter. With sampled drums, assorted electronic whooshes and atmospherics, male-female harmonies (but very little if any call-and response), and (usually) a pair of electric guitars up front, the Subs were sweet enough to be worth watching, but I couldn't imagine bothering with their record. Maybe there's something more to the lyrics (apparently the story of the band members' breakup, prior to their reunion); I'll probably never know. The female singer's enthusiasm did project, and I can see why people like them. I think they'd be a lot better with a real live drummer; they'd certainly be more interesting to watch. But if they're sticking with the laptop drums, they'd be wise to start creating beats out of other interesting, non-drum noises. Just a thought.

Oh, and they had a glockenspiel up there. Another glockenspiel band! Reminded me of the Bishop Allen, another group in danger of terminal cuteness but whom I liked more than the Subs. Three, as they say, will be a trend. Anyone else? I'm sure there's someone.

Anyway the Frames arrived around 10:00, and began with an unusually tender 6/8 ballad, called "Races". The band structured its set with about five quieter numbers up front, before breaking into their bread-and-butter material ("part two of the concert," said the singer). Although their recorded output includes a fair number of adventures (as far as I know, I'm not all that familiar), they definitely have a sweet spot of midtempo, vaguely adult-oriented contemporary rock plus electric violin, generally topped off with impassioned and/or pleading lyrics.

I imagine that sounds like I'm saying they seem fairly ordinary. Somewhere in the Counting Crows area, maybe: five-chord songs where the singer bitches about his girlfriend or something. Well, there are times when the Frames' material is pretty ordinary, and they certainly do some things a lot of other AAA/Jack FM-type bands can do. But there's another side to the Frames too, in which the personal idiosyncrasies of frontman Glen Hansard are entertained. The songs frequently seem to be built around the vocal, pausing for a word or phrase, changing tempo to suit his delivery. Instead of laying down regular grooves into which the singer can fit his words, the songs are set up to support his writing and timing. They play with structure a lot. He's a decent lyricist, usually offering up something fairly comparable to Ryan Adams' diary entries; it's the way the songs are set up that makes them convincing.

None of this would really work anywhere near as well as it does, though, if the Frames weren't extremely well-rehearsed and highly in touch with their instruments. I believe everyone in the band wore wireless belt packs and at least one earphone monitor; the overall sound and texture seemed to be of the utmost importance. Although the fiddle player took a few turns in the spotlight, the others seemed content to play with their heads down, without gesture or vanity.

In that sense, they're there to set up Hansard as he indulged some antics. He's a highly charismatic guy onstage, a true frontman in every way. He invited crowd participation on at least four or five songs if not more; he told good jokes in between songs; he's animated and passionate at the mic. I definitely thought he clowned a bit too much, undermining his material on a few occasions. And why in the world would he make a point of telling the crowd what a banal chord progression he'd written in "Fake," stifling the song's hooky propulsion by throwing in a few bars of "Private Dancer" and then most of "No Woman No Cry"?

Despite some of his overselling (or in the case of "Fake", underselling!), it's apparent that Hansard is deeply committed to his songs, and the night's best moment was probably his straightforward performance of "Finally," the first encore. No midsong talking, no goosing the crowd for a singalong -- only the thing I'd come there to see. The re-emergence of the Submarines for another song was charming enough, but slowed the Frames' momentum; I was pretty bored after that. The band tried to send everyone home with a final singalong they were supposed to take outside into the streets; I don't think it worked.

The Frames draw a heavily Irish crowd, and a crowd that likes to drink, and a crowd with a lot of women in it, and a crowd that likes to listen to songs about frustrating relationships. Being slightly ill, I experienced the evening stone-cold sober. Believe me, there was a lot of people-watching to be done as the somewhat-duller encores went down just after midnight. I hope there weren't any fights in the street afterward. Singing would be better.