The Halloween-inspired element of disguise was heavy and lent a strange and ominous quality to the night. Each member of Typhoon had a black eye-mask, and Avigdor Zahner-Isenberg (singer, guitarist, and one-third of band name Avi Buffalo) appeared to be Dexter from the Showtime series, donning a brown long-sleeved Henley (sans buttons), and a blood-spattered face. Avi-drummer Sheridan Riley fooled most of the crowd with a mouth-concealing mustache and bandana, rendering the “she” very much a “he” until whispering a very feminine “Thanks for coming” in the microphone and everyone turned to their neighbors and in true delivery-room fashion exclaimed “O-M-G, it’s a girl!” The costumes otherwise were merely amended versions of Portland indie-crowd street-wear: lumber jacks, Pabst-dragons, vintage starlets, and hybrid fairies in American Apparel cotton hoodies. The adornments were all lovely, clever, modest, and collectively surreal.
Now usually this only happens in sports, but sometimes “the home team” can bully out-of-town bands without intention. Like when more people show up to see the opening Portland band and disperse when the headlining band from, say, Long Beach starts to play. This unkind phenomenon has nothing to do with musical aptitude, and all to do with timing and publicity strategies. Though, one could suppose that if Typhoon hadn’t played at all, the crowd turnout would have been even smaller for Avi Buffalo. So, on second thought, Typhoon was a smart choice as an opener, considering that Typhoon is a band consisting of no less than eleven members—which means if they each invite one friend, and those friends invite one friend and so on, well, then you have a decently sized audience. The other factor working against our California friends was the date: the Saturday before Halloween, the city offering a multitude of creepy and costumed places to be at 11pm. In Avi Buffalo’s defense, they are profoundly talented and we will doubtless be seeing them play sold-out shows so long as their catchy yet un-insulting “What’s In It For?” slides through the ears of the right people. The song is pop precision at its best and most humble; on par with The Shins' poetic sophistication, the old-school slacker-rock appeal of Built to Spill, sexual innuendo, and piteous adolescent self-consciousness, Avi Buffalo has all the ingredients to make it big the right way.
Avigdor’s entire body lurches upward and his face squints up as he seems to strain to carry his voice to its upper levels. The result, however, works well as an organic—rather than electronic—filter, a detail I must applaud in light of all the musicians who use artificial effects to create a similar subhuman sound. This is especially so regarding vocals and their ability to showcase musical history (e.g. prominent blues guitar) within the contemporary. The similarities to Built to Spill circa Ancient Melodies of the Future are undeniable. When Sheridan actually sings, particularly in “One Last,” she evokes the Texas indie-ensemble Eisley, another band of baby-faces who can sing motherly lullabies with supernatural musical wisdom beyond their years. Avi Buffalo’s individual talents are difficult to pinpoint live, as I think their performance legs are still growing. But their recent self-titled album showcases the band approaching maturity, exquisitely out of its shell.
