Beyond the Canadian accents made quite clear when speaking the word about (read: a-boot), Montreal band Plants and Animals have a quirky personality—offsetting their laidback, jamming folk-rock flow—to offer fans that come to their show at The Frequency on Saturday, May 12. In fact, lead singer and guitarist Warren Spicer told The Daily Cardinal how much a great audience can sometimes make or break a show.
“[It]’s wonderful when you’re touring and you might have been in a van all day long and you’re tired and you’re not in the best position to get up on stage and then, bam, you’re kind of like ‘Wow, this audience really brought it,’” he said. “You want to perform and you want to give people everything you’ve got.”
However, the onus for a good show more often than not falls in the hands of the band itself.
“Sometimes we’ll just feel great and there could be 20 people in the room and we’ll— we can just totally give everything,” Spicer said.
An all-out performance becomes easy to visualize after watching Plants and Animals’ video for “The End of That,” from their latest album under the same name, which NPR featured on “All Songs Considered.” It showcases a satirical take on the common format of ’70s, retro variety hour television programming—complete with plastered-on smiles and near animatronics playing of instruments.
“We’re pretty laid-back people, we’re not terribly pretentious,” Spicer said. “So that video kind of lets you know we don’t have a problem having a good time and making fun of ourselves a little bit.”
Spicer met an inquiry of the band’s leopard-print Twitter background with equal good nature, though he didn’t have a specific reason why it had been set as such.
“No it’s just kind of sexy I think,” he said. “It kind of sexes up our Twitter page. I don’t do a lot of tweeting to be honest [though], it’s just never connected with me.”
Plants and Animals’ preferred means of connection with fans takes a more hands-on approach. Spicer said he loves to hear people’s stories about how they discovered the band and what they thought of the performance.
“That makes what we’re doing more meaningful, I think, when we actually meet people,” he said. “Those crazy life experiences, they seem more valuable and more real… Or [attendees can] just hang out at the bar after the show and have a beer or something.”
Camaraderie aside, it is definitely worth seeing Plants and Animals in person. Their live shows have received rave reviews in both the U.S. and Canada and give a little extra something to their tunes—they’re like your favorite jam band, but with a few more riffs and a raw sound that some may even call pop.
If you’re really trying to get a good idea for some of the quality content Plants and Animals has put out of late, get a hold of a car and a sunny day and cruise around blasting “Lightshow” from The End of That. You won’t be disappointed.
“Just uh, come to the show, try to be in a good mood, and if you’re not, hopefully we’ll be able to turn that around,” Spicer said.
It doesn’t seem like that will be a problem.
If you want to hear Plants and Animals in all their live fury and fauna, catch them at The Frequency on Sat., May 12. The show begins at 9:30 p.m. and tickets are $10, with Canasta opening the night.
