Song after song, Mikal Cronin briefly was left unaccompanied, strumming jazzy chords on his hollow-bodied 12-string electric guitar as he sang a lilting pop melody.
Then Cronin’s distortion effects and his band would kick in, and the songs would roar again.
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From the Jesus and Mary Chain to Nirvana to Sleigh Bells, a breed of musicians has mixed tunefulness with noisiness. There was plenty of both during Cronin’s show at the Logan Square Auditorium Thursday night, but the music would have benefited if there had been something more as well.
The Laguna Beach, Calif., native first gained notice as a member of the band of indie rock darling and high school classmate Ty Segall’s band, paving the way for a pair of solo records. The classically-trained Cronin’s sophomore effort, released this past spring, found him venturing beyond the garage rock sound he and Segall had forged into chamber pop.
During his performance, though, Cronin kept things raw and fuzzy as he crammed 13 songs into 50 minutes with near-Ramonesque efficiency. Even as his bouncy melodies recalled the Beach Boys and George Harrison, his voice was swallowed up in big, stormy guitars.
Second guitarist Chad Ubovich added cooing harmonies and took fleet, searing solos. Kyle Gibson drove the songs with clattering drumming, while Mike Anderson’s murky bass lines prowled through the underbelly of the songs.
The best of the songs made the most of Cronin’s template, as he filled “Shout It Out” with a big, sweeping chorus, and set a blue sky melody sailing over the jangling twin guitars of “Again and Again.” However, his lesser material quickly grew repetitive, with little to distinguish the churning chords and earnest melodies of “Situation,” “Get Along” and others.
Cronin’s lone encore offered some badly needed variety, as he and the band stretched out over a swampy groove during a rendition of Wreckless Eric’s “(I’d Go The) Whole Wide World,” somehow finding common ground between Velvet Underground drone and Creedence Clearwater Revival swamp rock.
Cronin could go places. He just needs to get out of the garage more often.