Photo credit: Kelsea McCulloch
Although you probably wouldn’t guess it from their innocuously charming dance pop, GGOOLLDD tend to inspire rather extreme reactions among local listeners, which seems to stem more from their ostensibly enviable status as the “Next Big Thing.” In Milwaukee, serious mainstream potential, which GGOOLLDD has in spades, often inspires people to divide into camps. On one side you have your relentless cheerleaders, who sometimes seem creepily thrilled at having fresh blood to sacrifice on the altar of national attention, and on the other you have the irrationally passionate detractors, who, usually in the dubious guise of representing “real” music, reflexively disparage the act du jour at every opportunity. The sensible opinion, as usual, is the rarer moderate one, namely that GGOOLLDD are neither the anti-Christ nor the second coming, but instead simply a decent way to spend a Saturday night.
Based on the headliners’ heavy radio play and considerable reputation as a live act, the sold-out crowd at the Turner Hall Ballroom Saturday clearly arrived expecting a good time, but the $10 cover charge likely didn’t hurt when it came to convincing people to attend. What’s more, the inexpensive admission price included a pair of smartly selected, similarly local, openers, first up being GGOOLLDD’s Gloss Records labelmate Rio Turbo. After a brief dry spell, the rambunctious partier found renewed inspiration on last year’s slate-cleaning self-titled release, which provided the material for this too-short set (aside from his tired, but admittedly crowd-pleasing, pantomiming of the Righteous Brothers’ “Unchained Melody”). Next came Canopies, who’s likably psych-infused synthpop is best when let loose, but also boasts its fair share of hooks, as heard on cuts like “Miss You Now” from their debut full-length Maximize Your Faith.
By the time it was GGOOLLDD’s turn to take the stage the audience occupied just about every inch of available space, even spilling onto the balcony which, happily, was actually open for once. Excitement was high, to the point where even the band seemed a little taken aback by the enthusiasm, not that it shook them in the slightest. Their entire image is heavily polished, well-suited for any pop star aspirations, but the group, led by charismatic frontwoman Margaret Butler, at least has songs to justify all the costume changes, elaborate lighting rigs and other window dressing. Here, their hour-long set included just about every entry in their slim-but-solid discography, augmented by a timely cover of Fleetwood Mac’s “Dreams.” All told it was an entertaining, well-rounded performance, but hardly worth the copious superlatives, positive or negative, usually used to describe them.
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