When Swedish/American trio Miike Snow rolled into town late last week for their Club Nokia and Wiltern gigs, they brought with them Mark Ronson & The Business International, who were out in support of their recently released Record Collection (featuring Q-Tip, MNDR, Miike Snow's Andrew Wyatt, Boy George, and others).
MNDR kicked off the somewhat early first night, talking of "connection" in between her one-woman electrodance songs. She stayed on as a major force in Mark Ronson's new outfit, partnering with Spank Rock on the jam Bang Bang Bang. Phantom Planet's Alex Greenwald and The Pipettes' Rose Elinor Dougall (with a few additional special guests) rounded out the packed on-stage crew.
After a rather lengthy set change, Miike Snow emerged through the dense fog and sang the first two songs clad in silver masks. Always a pleasure to watch and listen to, lead singer Wyatt moved between guitar and his recessed piano, while Christian Karlsson and Pontus Winnberg held court on opposite sides of the stage, their keyboards laden with antlers. Standout songs included all the favorites - Burial as song 2, messing it up for the entire photo pit as we tried to coordinate photo composition with singing and dancing; Silvia, which seemed to mark the moment at which the myriad of close-to-vomiting-or-fighting drunk folks were carried out of the venue (girls by their boyfriends and boys by the Club Nokia bouncers); the oft remixed Animal, which made a slew of people jump around wildly who had previously committed to the minimum of head-nodding and toe-tapping. I stayed to the last notes of the very end, wishing for another hour of the band, which is saying something. If you've not seen them before and you like to dance, you can be rest assured that the group never disappoints.
