Crows crowd pleasing; Live lifeless

By Chan Tran
Daily Forty-Niner

LOS ANGELES--Somewhere between Pearl Jam and Limp Bizkit, music listeners valued bands that sung about the poetic joy in being depressed.

Counting Crows and Live are two such bands.

On Monday, both bands  and about 15,000 participants  came together for a concert underneath the starry sky at the Greek Theatre in Los Angeles. All arms were outstretched with the music.

Counting Crows' lead singer and songwriter Adam Duritz, a self-professed insomniac, writes words that embraces the agony in discovering our own hidden desire for misguided love. He drowns his happiness and rescues his sorrows -- an emotional masochist.

So it was surprising to see the Crows perform songs they normally shy away from in past shows -- the singles -- and do it with the vigor of a band standing on fresh legs.

From the opening Bethoveen-esque piano of "Colorblind," to the ending rousing party song "Hanginaround," the Crows were shedding their I-don't-want-to-be-happy feathers and frolicked in the happiness of finally settling into their fame.

The two songs that catapulted their fame, "Round Here," and "Mr. Jones" became 10-minute concert versions showing Duritz's amazing sense of improvisation of lyrics. It was intended irony when Duritz change the lyrics of the latter song to "We all want to be famous,but we got f--ed-up reasons for that."

Fast songs, "Angels of the Silences," and "A Murder of One," were edgier and the band pushed to drown out the vocals. One would guess that was an intended move and a crucial point of the show to prove they're not  "an Adam Duritz backing band."

But while Counting Crows have given into their fame, Live furthered their status as the bratty half of the duo.

Live's frontman, Ed Kowalczyk, pranced and sang nasally through the band's pseudo-philosophical and poetic lyrics.

When sung live, alternative radio hits "I Alone," and "The Dolphins Cry," sheds light on what the band is capable of achieving, off-kilter philosophy and aggression, and what it lacks, a direction. One song after another starts with a quiet verse before heading towards a thundering chorus. The fact was most evident when watching the few Live fans that were there dance; imagine a combination of Sarah McLachlan and Pee Wee Herman.

Only "Lightning Strikes," their most humble and well-known song, moved the band pass the cookie-cutter songwriting style.

Now that the shows are over, one can sit at home and listen to the albums in a different light. For Counting Crows it is for vindication and for Live it is for reevaluation.