I’ve seen Father John Misty twice before, and his recent sold-out performance at Emo’s marked the third occasion. If you can see a band that has only a single album more than once and have the show be remotely entertaining, the artist deserves high accolades. Father John Misty far surpasses remotely entertaining and consistently delivers riveting, high-energy, and hilarious live performances, continuing to tour behind one of last year’s best albums.
Fear Fun is an album I’ve listened to more than any other in the last year or so, and it would seem I’m not the only one. Most of Father John Misty creative force Josh Tillman’s songs have becoming rollicking sing-alongs live, featuring wry, comedic lyricism full of seedy scenes, colorful characters, and cultural criticism. In complete contradiction, music lovers slam the merch-stand for copies of Fear Fun on vinyl just after Tillman stood onstage belting out (and had a packed house singing along), “Try not to think so much about the truly staggering amount of oil that it takes to make a record.” This is why we love Josh Tillman. Nothing is sacred and no one is safe from criticism, including the man himself.
Between song banter could be self-deprecating stand-up comedy, and the crowd laughs along non-stop. Tillman played almost the entirety of Fear Fun, shimmying and dancing as he usually does. Making good use of the spacious stage at Emo’s, Tillman fell to his knees, raising the mic stand over his head, and moved in aggressive, spastic bursts to the rhythm of his songs. Live, his voice is as impressive as on record if not more so, sounding particularly profound when he’s ad libbing and the moment strikes him.
Draped behind the band was a large tapestry or mural consisting of absurd outlandish imagery such as a naked woman cuddling a huge iPhone while laying on a pizza. This kind of outrageous imagery isn’t unusual for Tillman, who describes riding on a “horse knee deep in blood” on “Funtimes In Babylon,” though his excessive descriptions more often invoke biblical allusions rather than pop culture. During the night, Tillman’s onstage actions were almost as unexpected, at their most demure: holding a guitar backwards, by the neck, and strumming. On the more extreme end of the spectrum, Tillman climbed down from the stage and leaned out into the crowd to make advances on a girl in the front row before returning to the stage’s edge to sit coyly and inquire, “You’re not going to call me, are you?”
Covers have become an important and exciting part of Tillman’s set with covering classic songs from rock founding fathers to obscure cult songwriters to recent indie giants, including John Lennon, J.J. Cale, and the Flaming Lips. For this encore, Tillman chose to cover “Happiness Is A Warm Gun.” Sometimes a band just seems like they’re on your personal wavelength. Already a huge FJM fan, I was astounded when the band broke into one of my favorite Beatles songs, and they couldn’t have picked one more apt for their outrageous frontman. Tillman closed the night with “Honeybear, I Love You,” a track purportedly from his yet-to-be-announced full-length.
Earlier in the night Jessica Pratt performed a quiet set to an unapologetically noisy Emo’s crowd. Not to be a drag, but we’ve gotta point out that the continuing crowd talking and noise continues to be particularly disrespectful in Austin. Further, while we love Emo’s and C3, the show suffered from some confusion from the beginning, since the openers were changed. This was worsened when the show began a full half hour before it was supposed to during a peak time for concertgoers settling in. The show continued to see awkward energy as a full hour or more gap sprawled on between the opener and Father John Misty. Only Tillman could save it, and he certainly did.
