Concretes 2-26-11
Doug Fir Lounge · Portland, OR
BY TIM HINELY
I had never seen Sweden's Concretes before and couldn't tell from vocalist Lisa Milberg's comments that whether it was their first time in Portland or first time in the States (I'm assuming she meant the former). While the rest of the band was silent, the friendly Milberg chatted up the crowd about our fair city, how happy they were to be here and what there was to do tomorrow since they were going to stay here rather than head to Seattle early.
The band hit the stage as a 6-piece with guitar/bass/drummer, two keyboardists and the striking, icy cool Milberg up front on vocals (and occasionally shaking her money-maker on the dancier cuts). The band has been through quite a few changes the past few years with former vocalist Victoria Bergstrom going solo (as Taken by Trees) and one member apparently leaving the band to join the circus (!!??). Their latest record, WYWH, lacks the spark of earlier records, with a more sophisticated, groove-oriented dance pop sound, and while it didn't sound bad on headphones, on stage it seemed to lack that specialness of the earlier records (or what I'm guessing earlier gigs would have been like), and it seemed the set was made up mostly of songs off WYWH. They opened with "Good Evening" and sifted into other new cuts like the title track, "My Ways", "Crack in the Paint", "I Wish We'd Never Met", "Knck Knck" and others. They saved the single, "All Day' for last and then came out for a so-so encore and called it an evening.
Memo to the Concretes: time to regroup and decide on ways to spruce up the live show.
