Concert Mon Aug 17 2009

Review: Harvey Danger @ Schubas 8/15/09

By Stephanie Griffin

Fate led me to Harvey Danger's last Chicago show at Schubas on Saturday night. Having loved Where Have All the Merrymakers Gone? in junior high, they had completely fallen off my radar for the past ten years (yes, I realize I'm losing so much nerd cred right now). Then, one day a couple months ago I'd had my iTunes on shuffle mode and "Flagpole Sitta" started playing. What ever happened to this band? I'd immediately googled them to find out that they were about to call it quits, but not before one last small tour of club shows. The list of dates included Chicago, and lo and behold, tickets had gone on sale that very morning. It was destiny.

So what has Harvey Danger been up to these past several years? For starters, they released two additional albums - King James Version in 2000 and Little By Little... in 2005. The band was on a two year hiatus between the two albums, reuniting in 2004, albeit with a new drummer. Their last album, Little By Little..., was self-released and available as a free download through the band's website and BitTorrent, and was later re-released on Kill Rock Stars. Last May, the band announced they'd be breaking up via an announcement on their website, stating, "The decision is totally mutual and utterly amicable." They started their farewell mini-tour right here in Chicago with two sold-out shows at Schubas. And now we're all caught up.

What had surprised me upon making my way through the crowd on Saturday night was the amount of out-of-towners who came in for the concert. Later in the night, Sean Nelson, lead singer, took a poll on the matter, and it seemed to me about 75% of the crowd were from out-of-state, and of those, about half had driven over 1000 miles to get to Chicago. A group of maybe 6 or 7 had flown in for this night. Very impressive. To up the ante on Harvey Danger's nerd cred, the band was introduced by a recording of Jon Hodgman before embarking on their two hour set.

In the course of the next two hours, one thing was proven to me - I'd been a fool for ignoring this band for so many years. Between the emotive "Jack the Lion", the joyful "Wine, Women, and Song", and the audacious "Flagpole Sitta", this band sure knows how to tell a story within a song and pair it with a catchy tune. They played their big hit, "Flagpole Sitta", near the middle of the set, with a surprisingly indifferent crowd and band. Not that either party seemed annoyed with the song, although Sean Nelson wrapped up the song by saying, "We never intended to define the 90's... much like we never intended to invent emo." However, almost every other song seemed to get a bigger reaction, notably "Wooly Muffler" and "Radio Silence".

An hour into their set, they decided to open the floor up for requests. They had one rule - each request must be accompanied by an intelligent question. The questions ranged from "What's your favorite vegetable?" (A: avocado, which was later switched to broccoli after the crowd pointed out that an avocado is a fruit) to "Are you breaking up just to reunite in two years to do a sell-out national tour like The Pixies?" (A: "We sold out a long time ago."). They continued with an all-request set for the next hour, not leaving the stage until 2 AM.

The band has three shows left - one in L.A. on August 22nd and two in Seattle on August 28th and 29th, before disbanding for good.

I'm sorry I overlooked you all these years, Harvey Danger. Thank you for giving me one last chance.