De-evolution is Real...


So we went and saw Devo at the Paramount Theater in Oakland on Saturday night. It was pretty great, but I knew I’d end up a little disappointed. I’ve been listening to them since I was about 8 years old, thanks to having a brother almost 9 years older than me. I was too young to go see them when they were still in their prime, so I figured I had missed the boat and never bothered to go see them when I was old enough. I just found out today that my brother and two of his friends (who are like older brothers to me, I’ve known them forever) were at the show. They were on the floor and we were in the balcony, since both levels had their own bar, we never saw them. He denies he knew we were going, but I know we mentioned it in World of Warcraft chat, anyway.

Bow wow wow opened and they were suckola, so we went and I had another $5 Budweiser and people watched for awhile. I saw a few 40 something dads with their 12 year old sons and it was kind of cute. We had balcony seats, which were great for being able to see everything, but sucked energy wise. My bro had seats on the floor and they were up jumping around and screaming, but he said he couldn’t see much of the stage. Their seats were basically under ours. We could see everything great, but everyone just sat in their seats.

They started the show with a little movie about the proper attire to wear when attending a Devo show. Then they came on stage. It was the 4 original members with a different drummer (but they’ve had a different drummer for many years now). They were quite spry even with the gray hair and pot bellies. Jerry Casale had injured his back and played the entire show strapped to a board and a roadie had to help him get on and off stage. I’m not kidding. From what I’ve read, he slipped onstage on a piece of torn yellow jumpsuit and injured his back earlier on tour. He mentioned having a L-5 herniated disk. They just worked it into the show and strapped him to a board (it had lights and stuff) so it looked intentional.

They stuck to playing their good songs. They did play Whip It (I guess they have to) but they stuck it in the set early on and got it over with. They played “Come Back Johnee” as their last song which was weird (imo), but Mothersbaugh wore a giant foam cowboy hat and mustache and filled his crotch with a million rubber bouncy balls which he bounced into the audience.

I’m really only disappointed about the show because it seemed too short (over by 10:30, Devo from start to end was only an hour and only had the one movie at the beginning) and I knew they could never live up to my expectations. They’ve always been kind of the “perfect” band (we’ll just forget about those later albums) in my mind, that there was just no way they could be better than what I had built up in my mind over the years.

I asked my brother how they were compared to the other shows he’d been to. He’s actually gone to a lot of their shows when they were still in their prime (I’d say ‘New Traditionalists’ and earlier). He said the sound was better, but at some shows they did more movies. He saw the tour where they had the treadmills. I remember seeing them play on Saturday Night Live on the treadmills and it was great.

I’ll give them credit though, they still played in their short-shorts and kneepads. They did their jogging in place (though I suspect for not as long as they used to). All in all, it was pretty great. And yes, I do realize this is the worst show review ever written.