Jack’s Mannequin
W/ Head Automatica, The Audition, We Are The Fury
Feb. 18, 2007
Kool Haus

It came down to Andrew McMahon to save the night at Kool Haus and he did more than that when Jack’s Mannequin headlined at the Kool Haus. There was little to no crowd support for the opening acts, but that’s probably because they didn’t do anything to deserve it.

We Are The Fury opened the show and clearly didn’t have the mix right on their music. The singer, whose gender I was debating for a time based on wardrobe and hair style, had their vocals turned up far too high and was still basically screaming into the mike most of the time. He came across as arrogant as well, constantly prodding the crowd to sing along to songs they obviously didn’t know. Their keyboardist also looked like Devon Soltendieck from MuchMusic fame and acted the same way (if you picture Devon on keys that is). The entire act came across badly, but not the worst of the night.

Second up, The Audition put on a decent performance but was nothing great. Hailing from Chicago, it appears that singer Danny Stevens is taking hair advice from city-mate William Beckett from The Academy Is… While their crowd reception still wasn’t very warm, they still tried to win them over with ass-shaking songs and even ended their set by crawling into the crowd during their farewell song.

By far the worst performance of the evening came from Head Automatica who legitimately looked as if they didn’t want to be there. Dressed in suits as an obvious bad gimmick attempt, they played their pop songs in a very business like manner, rarely talking to the crowd. Their sound mixing was fairly off like We Are The Fury’s set with their vocals too high. There was also a piercing sound coming from the keyboard at times that was enough drive someone insane. The little interaction they had with the crowd came to an end when singer Daryl Palumbo, with what seemed like sarcasm, thanked the crowd for their support even though they were shown no love throughout their set.

Proving worthy of being true headliners, Jack’s Mannequin came out to close the night and had everyone moving. They opened their set with “Holiday From Real” and had the crowd from there on. McMahon had a grand piano on stage and even while seated, had more energy than one could ever expect for someone recovering from cancer. The oddest thing about their set was his weird obsession with pointing towards the roof and all other directions while playing.

They played nearly every song that they could off of Everything In Transit and even dipped into the Something Corporate catalog for “She Paints Me Blue” and a toned-down, piano-filled version of “Punk Rock Princess.” They closed with “Into the Airwaves” before leaving the stage before an encore.

After a minute or so break, McMahon came back out and told another story; his third of the evening which were all generally funny and involved either freshman girls, strip searches and marijuana. After “La La Lie” he asked the crowd if they had heard of a little-known band called The Police before playing the classic “Message In A Bottle” with Audition singer Danny Stevens while on the guard rail. The night came to an end with both part 1 and 2 of “Made For Each Other” and included some amazing solos across the board on guitar, bass, drums and piano; an amazing show of talent.

What impressed me most about the entire show was Jack’s Mannequin’s ability to transform their pop-like sound from their studio tracks into something with a big-time rock feel. Songs like “Mixed Tape” and “I’m Ready” came through especially huge. Their big sound and energy saved an otherwise disappointing night.


- Dan Bilicki





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