Screaming Females frontwoman Marissa Paternoster is probably really nice, as long as you keep her away from guitars.
If invited to a party, she’d arrive, elegant dress and bangs just a little unkempt in that charming way. Then she’d see a guitar in the corner and ask, “Mind if I play?”
An hour later the furniture would be broken, the cat shaved bald and there’d be a ringing in your ears — not that you’d mind a bit.
Paternoster is a complex performer, who as she held court in a less than half-full Logan Square Auditorium Tuesday night, made you realize how easy it would be to reduce her to an oddball anomaly. A female guitar hero. Imagine that. Yes, she rips a guitar to shreds. But as Paternoster stalked the stage, bellowing out songs in a way that made the derivation of her band’s name clear, something else became apparent: she’s a rock ‘n’ roller from the old school, blues roots and bite apparent, a guitarist for whom virtuosity is incidental because it’s all about the songs.
During a 2013 stint on a Garbage tour, the band’s frontwoman Shirley Manson called Paternoster “The most amazing alternative rock star I have heard to date who has yet to be festooned with praise.”
It still hasn’t happened (really) and most people who hear this band have approximately zero idea why. It isn’t just that Paternoster is good. This band — bassist King Mike and drummer Jason Dougherty — is good in a way that makes you wonder about the rock stardom system. The biggest problem is that rock just doesn’t rock all that hard. And the hard-to-place Females aren’t garage, nor punk. And only one of them is in fact female, so forget about that girl group stuff. But let’s not get mired in semantic quibbles when there’s butt to be kicked.
“Starve the Beat” did nothing of the sort, a pell-mell flail of the sort this band specializes in, old-school rock that would have been at home on the stage at Woodstock. Paternoster has equal parts blues singer and J. Mascis. Like the Dinosaur Jr. frontman, she’s a guitar hero who really isn’t, an artist who sees solos as a natural part of the song rather than the point of the song.
She speaks in a soft, almost shy voice, but the music starts and she screams, howls, bellows and coos. “Adult Army” was an exploration of dynamics, “Rotten Apple” a skirling confessional. Yes, every song contained a guitar solo, moments in which Paternoster was almost transfigured. “Bell,” like most of her solos, had an almost crazed intensity, fingers flitting about way up the neck of the guitar, intricate structures in which the solo becomes just another lyric. The guitar is just Paternoster singing in a different way, a companion more than a diversion.
But most importantly, Screaming Females put on a rock show. Pummeling without pandering, intimate but rarely interacting, Paternoster was an irresistible force that might have been preaching to the choir but boasted the power to sway any congregation.
Pujol from Nashville opened, an effervescent, charming quartet fronted by Daniel Pujol, that would be power pop in another, less-indie world. Today they’re that poppy sort of bubble gum semi-punk, catchy songs with hooks galore, propelled by a drummer who did nothing fancy but kept the rhythm smooth, effortless and elegant.
“Junebug” included a shout out to a visual artist and some rather unfortunate falsetto moments, easily forgiven because it was a wonderful, toe-tapping set from a band you could take home to Mom.
Twitter @tribunekevin.
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