Finally saw the New Pornographers last night, and Liz is right, the panda t-shirt they had for sale was uber, uber-cute (and designed by Madison alumni Aesthetic Apparatus!).

Destroyer opened, and I wanted to check their set out to see if it would help me get more into them. Some people seem to really love Destroyer, and I haven't been able to get on board. I hoped a live set might show me what I was supposed to be missing. Sadly, that was not to be- I found Dan Bejar & Co. to be just as boring as I do on CD. Oh well.

The six members of the New Pornographers eventually made their way up on stage and each took their place, never again to move from their respective spots. For such a fun band, I was surprised they didn't move around a bit more on stage- it seemed a bit low energy, at least during their main set; things seemed to pick up a bit during their two encores. They started things off with "Twin Cinema" and "Use It" and proceeded to play a set sampling fairly equally from all three of their albums, with a slight emphasis on Twin Cinema. Hilariously, every few songs or so, Dan Bejar would make his way on stage to sing "Jackie Dressed in Cobras," and every time he'd come out progressively more tanked, with a new drink in his hand. By the time he made it out for the second encore to sing "Jackie," he could hardly stand or open his eyes, prompting jokes from Neko and Carl Newman about his drunken attempts backstage to pick up an English woman.

As I've already mentioned, the band played two encores, one they dubbed the "Electric Version super-set" with "Testament to Youth and Verse" and "Miss Teen Wordpower" and one the "Mass Romantic super-set" with "Jackie," "Body Says No" and, thankfully, "Letter From an Occupant" (I don't think I would have forgiven them if they hadn't played that, but it was such an obvious closer I wasn't too worried about it). Those last three songs were probably the best of the night, when the band seemed to be having the most fun on stage, Neko's voice was strongest, and Dan Bejar was totally trashed.

Final note: looks like the New Pornos are coming back to the Metro for New Years Eve- $60 a ticket (a steal! said head Porno Carl Newman). Hopefully there'll be a lot of great new year's shows to choose from this year!