Okkervil River's Saturday afternoon set at Mohawk was a decidedly different affair than their headlining show the day before at Flamingo Cantina. That day's set was apparently rushed along by all manner of technical and administrative difficulties, and it showed; the band railroaded through a breakneck, nearly non-stop 30 minutes of hits and audience captivation.
At the MOG/Lexus showcase on Saturday, however, they seemed a different band as they took the stage. As if their sets earlier in the week had worked the kinks out of their SXSW routine, they came across at ease and confident and ready to take their part of the afternoon's confluence of perfect weather and enormous line-up.
The set rollicked and rolled the whole way through, with Sheff leading the audience clapping along time after time, riffing and dipping deep into his vocal bag of tricks on favorites like "Unless It's Kicks," and "For Real". Perhaps the clearest indicator of their tightness during this current tour is the thoroughly worked out button that closed the jams at both shows - a series of cascading and compound hits ending the show on a perfectly clean cutoff - no small feat for a six-piece after sweating it out at full steam for 45 minutes for the fifth time in four days.
