DeVotchKa and the dying opera

The sun was descending during my first live experience with DeVotchKa. The open-air stage, backlit by the summer sky of muted pastels, stood atop the hill where the Getty Museum overlooks west Los Angeles. As heartbreaking as a Los Angeles sunset can be, with its miraculous neon reactions of smog and sun, the setting sun was more a backdrop to the theatrical live presentation of a band that beats life into the slowly dying art of music performance.

What seems to be a result of my age gaining momentum into its mid-20s, live shows have started to become less and less fulfilling, yet I am going more and more. I think the main reason for my consistent credit card bill, filled with Troubadour and Spaceland receipts, is a desire to observe that presentation of the sound, where the music becomes more a place of meaningful vacation rather than notes mismatched with glib banter of inane comments about alcohol levels and less than humble proclamations of gratitude.

As the polka bass beat began Devotchka’s set at the Troubadour, main man, Nick Urata, and multi-instrumentalist drummer-cum-trumpeter, Shawn King, were found in the rafters. Spotlight stunned, armed with brass amidst smiles of awkwardness, the two began the ringing melody of “La Llorona,” an old tune redone for the recent Little Miss Sunshine soundtrack. All I could think of was how this is what live music is supposed to be like, a “show,” an experience where audience and performer communicate between applause and silence, spotlights and shouts. This is what I see when I close my eyes and listen to How It Ends, foreign verandas filled with lovers crooning and Romeos calling forth from the balconies to their long lost Juliets.

With “Til The End Of Time” being a possible contender for an Oscar nod this year for its place in Little Miss Sunshine, DeVotchKa might be able to demonstrate to the world how opera and world music do, in fact, have a place in modern pop music. The Content is praying.

[mp3] DeVotchKa – Til The End Of Time (from Little Miss Sunshine OST)
[mp3] DeVotchKa – The Last Beat Of My Heart (from Curse My Little Heart EP)
[mp3] DeVotchKa – The Oblivion (from Una Volta!)

BONUS [mp3] DeVothcKa – Venus In Furs (Live) (Velvet Underground Cover)

Buy DeVotchKa here.