The Duke Spirit 5/10

It did not take me long to figure out I would be a huge fan of The Duke Spirit when I listened to Neptune for the first time. This London based band's hypnotic, dramatic tone haunted and captivated me. Their sound reminds me of something similar to the Yeah Yeah Yeahs meshed with The Kills and Sonic Youth, perhaps deeply inspired by the Patti Smith Group and Velvet Undergound. I'd been trying to branch into more strong, female-led, contemporary music and here I'd found it.



It was a blessing to be able to see them at such an intimate venue such as the Troubadour, where I could just easily walk right up to the front of the stage and be right in front of the beautiful Liela Moss.

She just absorbed the energy of the crowd and sent it straight back with her expressive face and animated movements. I couldn't get a wide enough shot of the entire band but what was striking is how much she contrasts with the rest of the band. Sure the lead singer will often stand out but here she was, the only female among the group and the only one with startlingly blond hair while the rest of the group consists of similar looking guys with brown hair.



So even though I consider myself primarily a fan of male-centric, Los Angeles based punk rock, I can confidently throw The Duke Spirit high up on my list of favorite bands, perhaps my very favorite among modern-day female-fronted bands. I left with the impression that in the near future I'd be bragging about getting to see this band at a smaller venue for really not that much money.

This was an excellent start of a series of about 10 more concerts I got coming up, most of them being with the primary author of this wonderful blog. Apparently we first attended an epic National concert at the same time at the Wiltern in October of 2007 before we even met, then later we meet at work and eventually see Cat Power in February 2008 and from then we meet another die-hard concert goer and before I know it most of all my income seems to goes to Ticketmaster.com. While I don't exactly love Ticketmaster, I don't think I'll be regretting any of these awesome experiences and I will keep at until I'm on the brink of bankruptcy.

Next concert coming up for me: REM with The National and Modest Mouse on 5/29 at the Bowl.