Seattle Loves Concrete Blonde at the Neptune, By Holly Homan

cc_29[1] — "Powerful and sensual vocals"

On January 25th I headed out on a chilly, rainy night to catch Concrete Blonde at Seattle’s Neptune Theater. I’ve seen Concrete Blonde two or three times prior, but I’ll see them 100 more times if I can.

When Concrete Blonde initially came on stage, it looked like they were wearing skull masks and they were bathed in purple light. At this time I was seated in the balcony. They started their show with a cover of Midnight Oil’s Beds Are Burning. I thought their rendition was better than the original, but with the powerful and sensual vocals of Johnette Napolitano, any song is going to sound good. As beautiful as her voice sounds on their recordings, her voice is ten times more beautiful and powerful when hearing her sing live.

Soon after, they performed my favorite song, Joey – a song about loving someone with alcoholism. Napolitano sings each song as if she’s making love to each one. Her stunning vocals were beautifully accompanied by her playing bass guitar, the zealous drumming of Gabriel Ramirez and soulful guitar playing of James Mankey, who switched on and off between acoustic and electric guitar.

For much of the first part of the show, there was little audience interaction. Napolitano even ignored the various shouts from men in the audience of, “You’re a goddess” or “You’re beautiful.”

The first half of the show was filled with mostly slow songs and dry ice was intermittently blown over the stage, giving it a creepy, macabre aura. The tempo picked up considerably when they performed God Is A Bullet – a song about the horror of gun violence.

While she sang, Napolitano’s thick, dark main would often fall forward and cover her face. She wore a black knit mini-dress with white floral etchings, stockings and black boots. The entire band wore black adding to the macabre feeling.

When she finally chatted with the audience, she revealed how her bass guitar turned up missing in Portland. She added she wouldn’t say anything bad about Portland. There was only one mean guy there and he was some sort of bouncer dude.

Other notables songs played were Caroline, Someday and another of my favorites, Bloodletting (The Vampire Song).

Toward the end, Napolitano switched to acoustic guitar while Mankey played the bass, proving that Concrete Blonde is a composed of very versatile musicians.

The entire show lasted an hour and a half with a one-song encore. Judging by the enthusiastic and raucous response from the audience, I’d surmise that Seattle loves Concrete Blonde.

– Holly Homan