Ed Robertson, leader singer of the Barenaked Ladies, said, in reference to his writing of the theme song for The Big Bang Theory, “it was meant to be silly and they loved it.” This statement could also be used to sum up the Barenaked Ladies concert at the Pabst Theatre on Monday night.
It was silly and we loved it.
The Barenaked Ladies, Ed, Jim, Kevin and Tyler clearly enjoyed rocking Milwaukee. They joked about the unnatural amount of vowels in Pabst. They commented on the seeming clash of Eastern European and Native American culture seen in the names around the city (think, Menominee / Schlitz). Tyler endeared himself to the crowd by mentioning the Packers’ win over the Cowboys. The ‘Ladies’ like to entertain and they are good at it.
I first saw the Barenaked Ladies, oh, about 20 years ago in Thunder Bay, Ontario. Steve Page was still the lead singer and If I had a Million Dollars was a huge hit, in Canada, anyway. I remember the Ladies were piped, as in the bagpipes, in to the auditorium. They were energetic and crazy. There was lots of jumping and dancing going on.
Monday’s concert lacked a little of that energy, but then 20 years on, so did I. Their classic songs, One Week, The Old Apartment and Brain Wilson were mildly disappointing, merely for the lack of Page’s voice.
But the Pabst rocked.
The Ladies impressed with their impromptu rap song about Milwaukee and the humor rising from Ed’s trip to the zoo. They reminisced about playing at Summerfest and commented on the fact that no one outside of Milwaukee knows that Summerfest is the largest music festival in the world. And that’s true, Milwaukee, get on that!
Finally, if you go to their website www.barenakedladies.com/home you can see a picture of Kevin Hearn with ….. the Fonz!
How cool is that?!!?
