Ben Folds once described his melodramatic piano-pop band as “punk rock for sissies,” which, in a way, is exactly what the band’s music is. Folds has churned out scathing ballad after scathing ballad, sometimes going for subtlety (“Brick”) and sometimes going for outright, humorously awkward anger (“A Song for the Dumped”).
Ben Folds Five brought their over-dramatic, self-deprecating brand of piano-driven pop to Kleinhans Music Hall in Buffalo on Friday, Oct. 5. Playing atop a stripped-down stage, Folds and his bandmates, bassist Robert Sledge and drummer Darren Jessee, delivered angsty and somewhat nostalgic doo-wap pop-rock. They kicked off the night with the album cuts “Michael Praytor, Five Years Later” and “Missing the War.” Most songs stuck to a pretty simple, pretty effective formula. Folds crooning about relationship bitterness and break-ups over his piano, with Sledge and Jessee crooning ooohh’s or aaahh’s in the background.
Some of the most exciting moments in the show came during impromptu breaks for crowd-interaction. At one point, Ben Folds told the audience that he had “fond memories” of playing in Buffalo, and proceeded to whine about the cold and how we pronounce the word “ass” (apparently we pronounce it aaass). This drove many in the crowd to shout various incarnations of the word at the band, including one woman who complimented Folds’ derriere. Another humorously offbeat moment came when Folds stopped the show to tune five keys on his piano. It was a long and pretty awkward break in the show. The plus side was getting to hear what audience-goers screamed at him. When he finally got his piano tuned, Folds thanked the fans for their profoundly humorous remarks, to which someone shouted “thank you.” Folds paused suddenly, and remarked “I don’t know why this happens; I have the kindest hecklers,” which pretty well summed-up his relationship with the crowd throughout the night.
Die-hard Folds fans probably appreciated his context behind some of the songs. He explained the meaning behind “Draw a Crowd,” explaining about that the difference between “introverts” (small indie rock groups) and “extroverts” (huge crowd-pleasers like Coldplay or U2) is that the latter would never resort to something as childish as drawing penises on dressing room walls as a kind of desperate plea for attention. And sure enough, the chorus of that song is “if you can’t draw a crowd, draw dicks on the wall.”
Toward the end of the night, Folds traded pieces with subtle, almost beautiful heartache to outright, tongue-in-cheek relationship aggression. With his off-beat sort of nerd-anger, Folds sneered through “A Song for the Dumped” and “One Angry Dwarf and 200 Solemn Faces.” The former featuring the line “give me my money back, you bitch” and the latter featuring “kiss my ass.”
After a short break, Folds and Co. returned to the stage to play some of his lighter, gentler pieces: “Magic” and “Underground.” The shift seemed a fitting end to a band that’s found a lovably awkward marriage between punk-rock angst and piano-driven doo-wap, with a heavy dose of heartache thrown into the mix.
Set List:
Michael Praytor, Five Years Later
Missing the War
Hold that Thought
Jackson Cannery
Selfless
Erase Me
Alice Childress
Sky High
Landed
Thank You for Breaking My Heart
The Battle of Who Could Care Less
Kate
Brick
Draw a Crowd
Rock this Bitch
Philosophy
Narcolepsy
A Song for the Dumped
Army
One Angry Dwarf and 200 Solemn Faces
Encore:
Magic
Underground
All Photos by Michael Mietlicki.
We would like to thank Mike Montoro for the tickets and Shira Knishkowy from Big Hassle Media for the photo pass for the show.
