Four Days of Cheap Girls

FRIDAY
I’m reading the newspaper in the morning, scanning over the “variety” section to read whatever has been written up about the concert I’ll be seeing the next night: The Hold Steady playing at the Weesner Amphitheater in the Minnesota Zoo. I know, a zoo, but it’s actually a great venue for an outdoor show. I see the Hold Steady gets a mention, which is no surprise due to the band’s deep local roots. I also see they’re playing with an opening act -- a band I haven’t heard of before called Cheap Girls. The first thing that comes to mind is how a friend of mine from high school always said the best name for a band would be Free Roast Beef, because people would see that name on the sign outside and would absolutely come in to see the show. I don’t know, I guess he had a thing for roast beef. But of all the other potential band names in the world, it didn’t surprise me to see someone may have applied that same logic string and named themselves Cheap Girls.

I like to think of opening acts as opportunities. I’ve seen some tragically awful ones in my concert-going days, but I’ve also discovered a few that have become staples in my music library. I went on iTunes and was surprised to see Cheap Girls already had something like three or four albums to their name. I played a few previews to see what I was getting into, and thought they would be a reasonable sonic match for The Hold Steady. But I was too preoccupied in getting ready to see The Hold Steady for the first time, so I didn’t bother checking out Cheap Girls any further.

SATURDAY
I drive to my sister’s house in the late afternoon. Almost as soon as I arrive my brother-in-law Dave hands me a CD -- Cheap Girls. Dave is a very enthusiastic music fan, and in his own words, once he discovers a new band he goes in all the way. Even though he’s a huge Hold Steady fan, he said he was almost more excited to see Cheap Girls since they had become a new favorite of his. He said they had a guitar-drive power pop sound that reminded him a lot of Bob Mould’s old band Sugar. From what I’d heard in the previews, I agreed with that description.

We got to the zoo in plenty of time for the show, including Cheap Girls. They turned out to be a trio, with the bass player doubling as the singer. The thing about them I couldn’t get past was how much the bass player/singer looked exactly like what I’d imagine Nephew #3 will look like in fifteen years (at least from where we sat). It was striking.

Overall I liked the sound. The songs were surprisingly structured for an up-and-coming alternative band, and while there wasn’t exactly a lot of virtuosity on display, they were a nice, tight live band. They looked like three guys who had been randomly matched up by student housing in college and decided they might as well start a band since they had all the instruments covered. The singer had some odd mannerisms, like standing up on tiptoes at random moments, bumping the microphone forward an inch or so with his chin when he sang, and walking around like he just woke up with his bass in his hands during guitar solos.

SUNDAY
I imported the disc and loaded it up to my phone to give the album some car time, which I’ve found is the best way to learn new music. But then I wound up editing almost the whole day and got distracted by my revision playlist, so I forgot about it.

MONDAY (today)
I was determined to play Cheap Girls for all of my driving today, to give them that necessary car time. The first song, “Slow Nod,” started off promising, with the kind of celebratory sound you’d expect to hear during a final photo montage during the closing credits of a movie about people who just survived a wacky, shenanigan-filled summer and came away from it as better people. The next few songs were remarkably similar, and I found myself driving the long way when I could to listen to it more. The singer's voice was a little on the nasally and twangy side for me, but at least the guitars were higher in the mix and they sounded great.

The album, “Famous Graves” (the title of which reminds me of a favorite book of mine, KILLING YOURSELF TO LIVE by Chuck Klosterman), isn’t very long, clocking in at just under thirty-six minutes, with some songs barely long enough to play you though finding your way out of a parking lot. But a straight-ahead guitar rock song that’s only three minutes long can be about perfect, and Cheap Girls have some good ones. This could be an album that will get some plays from me this summer, but I think it will end up being something imprinted on the summer of 2014 instead of having much staying power.

But hey: A few more plays through, and who knows....?