"Wobbling between the monitors, the Green sisters continued to talk more about being drunk and the desire to fuck before going into the Madonna 'Dress You Up' rip-off, 'Stay the Night.'"
The biggest problem that MySpace mall-hair electro bands face today is expiration. As their target audience grows up, the younger generations of the would-be demographic's birth years fall farther and farther into the late '90s. What does this all mean? Well, eventually, acts like Millionaires, who are still trying to maintain a visual MySpace style, become mere Wikipedia entries of the past, a trend in Internet time that only old people talk about it.
After a surprising amount of time passed between sets -- considering Millionaires don't have so much as a DJ or a backing band -- the Green sisters traipsed out from behind the tiny stage curtain just around 10:30 p.m., flinging their endearing trademark "bitches," "whores" and "sluts" pet names all over the squealing audience.
"ALCOHOL" came first, the women shouting at the crowd that they had gotten sufficiently inebriated before the concert in an attempt to make their onlookers happy. How this drunken admission was supposed to be flattering was unclear, but the little faces under pink bows lining the foot of the stage seemed satisfied by their entertainers.
"Take Your Shirt Off" and "Just Got Paid Let's Get Laid" shared verses about VIP-status and vaginas before Millionaires' "mixtape" version of Ludacris's "My Chick Bad" blew up the spot. Wobbling between the monitors, the Green sisters continued to talk more about being drunk and the desire to fuck before going into the Madonna "Dress You Up" rip-off, "Stay the Night."
Part of the appeal of this duo is their look, and the neon backlighting utilized on stage for most of the night sorely mishandled this opportunity for visual entertainment. Instead, all that could be seen were the big hairy monster-like shadows of hair and occasional drowning hand wave. Closing the evening with "Party Like a Millionaire," it was clear that the Green sisters may have actually been as drunk as they claimed.
Earlier in the evening, the fittingly named Set It Off got things started after locals Caramel Carmela (which we missed) with a minute-long jutting guitar cover of Pitbull's "Give Me Everything" that proved to be the highlight of the quintet's set. The throwaway band moved in a treadmill-style togetherness, heads lurching forward to the drumbeat as they smiled through predictably titled songs like "End in Tragedy" and "Together Forever." The worst was "Horrible Kids," a song with a chorus that took the word "horrible" and stretched its syllables until they became a garbled and unrecognizable mess.
After their set, the dudes from Set It Off wandered the crowd hawking their own CDs in an awkward attempt to connect with (and sell to) potential fans. In context, it was probably an appropriate sales approach, considering this type of music still thrives between the overcrowded clothing racks of the Zumiez and Pac Suns of America.
Christian TV, a band so strangely put together it was visually unclear if they were actually real or just guitar techs for the band, followed. Appearing to be older than the rest of the acts on the bill, the total weirdos jumped their way through a maybe twenty-minute set of songs about being in love, singer and figurehead Christian Berishaj flipping his greasy, long-on-the-top-shaved-underneath hair back and forth between creepy dude head strokes and microphone cradles.
Berishaj dropped some faux-inspirational words about being yourself before leading the sixteen and under crowd in a "fuck that" chant. The biggest disappointment about this band was its abuse of a good name -- Christian TV sounded like it was going to rule. It didn't.
Next came the lighting rig and smoke machines in preparation for Breathe Electric, a band that looked, acted and sounded like it belonged in the party scene of a movie about the last days of one's awesome high school career. Minor technical difficulties mid-song only made room for an awkward silence that served to expose lead singer Grant Harris's cardboard cut-out personality. He picked the stage banter up again and led his band through "Stop Actin'" and "Let Go" before ending another of the evening's stunted sets.
CRITIC'S NOTEBOOK
Personal Bias: No bias. If anything, I had a desire to see Millionaires again in the hopes that the show would be better than the last time the duo came through. By the Way: I had a passing thought/dream that maybe if Millionaires took their own drunk-on-booze-and-club-power anthems seriously, the Green sisters could be awesome feminists and activists. Random Detail: The amount of Victoria's Secret body spray wafting through the venue was enough to kill a large animal.
