Just a year after they formed their namesake band while quarantining at Mom and Dad's house, Austin Durry turned to his kid-sister Taryn before their penultimate song Friday with an incredulous grin.
"I don't know if you've heard, but we're playing the First Avenue main stage," he said.
That same broad, holy-bleep-style smile flashed across the faces of all seven acts that performed over five high-energy hours of live music for First Ave's Best New Bands of 2021 showcase.
An annual tradition that got put off for two years due to COVID — and then was delayed two more months by omicron — Best New Bands night is always rife with the excitement of local musicians playing First Ave's main room for the first time. Coming off the pandemic, though, these bands were thrilled to be playing on any stage.
You wouldn't have known it by the their polished, tour-ready performance, but Durry was one of several acts on the lineup that had played only a handful of gigs before Friday. Instead, many of them generated a buzz posting music online during quarantine.
The newbies rose to the test, though. Even the more electronically based acts on the bill, climactic rapper Papa Mbye and sexily chillaxed R&B singer Kokou Kah, showed up with full-scale live bands that blended jazz, funk and rock instrumentation. The latter also donned a stylish, urban-harlequin look to stand out as one of the night's best-dressed stars, alongside Lanue singer Sarah Krueger.
A Duluthian singer/songwriter, Krueger told the crowd she made her billowing pink dress herself out of thrift-store curtains after the BNB show was delayed in January.
"Those extra two months gave me enough time to do it," said Krueger, whose all-star Lanue lineup far and away had the most live-show experience on the bill (with ace sidemen Erik Koskinen, Steve Garrington, Richard Medek and Ben Lester). Their mastery was evident in gracefully arranged, soothing neo-twang songs like "What I Love the Most."
Also showing off stylish musicality Friday — especially when it came to their four-part vocal interplay — Stillwater area jazz-pop band Honeybutter came across like a younger, saucier, F-bomb-singing Manhattan Transfer and wound up being a surprise hit with the three-quarters-full crowd.
When it came to raw power, though, wiry soul-rocker Evv took the prize in the second-to-last slot before Durry with their alternately bombastic yet tender and haunted-sounding songs such as "Submissive." Probably none of Friday's acts will be more intriguing to see evolve in the coming years.
Another visceral, guttural performance came in the opening set by underage punk quartet Vial, whose members traded vocals, instruments and wise cracks and ended their set with a hyper-riled rendition of Olivia Rodrigo's "Brutal" (candidate for best song of 2021).
One more infectiously fun cover tune came at the very end of the night, after First Ave's movie-screen curtain had to be re-raised for Durry's well-earned encore. They pulled out Jimmy Eat World's "The Middle," which nicely matched their own big-chorused, low-self-esteemed rock songs, such as "Losers Club" and "Who's Laughing Now."
Hearing the crowd verbosely sing along to many of Durry's songs was a reminder of the vital promotional power the internet played for young bands during COVID lockdown. Friday's long-awaited concert, however, proved there's still no matching the kinetic power of live music — especially when displayed by newcomers ready to take on the world.
