{"id":258579,"date":"2025-09-27T11:09:18","date_gmt":"2025-09-27T11:09:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/258579\/"},"modified":"2025-09-27T11:09:18","modified_gmt":"2025-09-27T11:09:18","slug":"dandy-warhols-brought-last-gasp-of-gen-x-cool-to-dallas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/258579\/","title":{"rendered":"Dandy Warhols Brought Last Gasp of Gen X Cool to Dallas"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\"band
\n\t\t\t\t\t\tThe Dandy Warhols with special guest Kula Shaker at The Kessler Theater on Thursday night. What\u2019s one more rock tour, among friends?\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

Paul Salfen<\/p>\n

There was a moment right before the turn of the century when The Dandy Warhols<\/a> seemed like they were the next big thing. A starry signing to a major label (Capitol), a bouncy hit (\u201cBohemian Like You\u201d) appearing everywhere from a PlayStation game to Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and a video directed by the iconic photographer David LaChapelle. They were even buddies with David Bowie.<\/p>\n

And then that\u2026 didn\u2019t happen. But the Portland-based band kept going, delivering their fuzzy mix of psych rock, shoegaze and power pop to the music lovers who appreciated catchy tunes with an extra icing of irony. On Thursday night, that included a Dallas stop at The Kessler Theater<\/a>, downgraded from the larger Longhorn Ballroom.<\/p>\n

There might not be enough Dandy fans in the Dallas-Fort Worth area to pack the latter, yet The Kessler was full of a smaller (yet no less passionate) crowd excited to see singer Courtney Taylor-Taylor, guitarist Peter Holmstr\u00f6m, synth-bassist Zia McCabe and drummer Brent DeBoer do their thing.<\/p>\n

But first came the psychedelic stylings of Kula Shaker, another band that had a late \u201990s moment during the era of Britpop. Led by singer Crispian Mills and elevated by Jay Darlington\u2019s trippy keyboard stylings, Kula played a full 17 songs to the Dandy\u2019s 15, making them more of a co-headliner.<\/p>\n

With a backdrop of a combo computer graphics\/live liquid light show, their sitar-inflected set included nods to Hawkwind and Deep Purple before wrapping up with their biggest stateside song, the tambura-tinged \u201cGovinda.\u201d<\/p>\n

Then it was time for the main event. The Dandy Warhols hewed close to a greatest hits set list and a tight running time\u2014no mean feat for a group known for their two-hour-plus jamathons. In comparison to Kula\u2019s vivid staging, the band\u2019s set was incredibly pared back, with a nearly black stage and minimal blue and red hues illuminating the back of the band members\u2014a perfect visual representation of their general too-cool-for-school attitude. Even the notoriously louche frontman Taylor-Taylor took a step back, never really striding forward to take his place in the spotlight.<\/p>\n

Launching into \u201cRide\u201d off their debut 1995 disc Dandys Rule Ok, one got the feeling that (despite their fervent fan base), The Dandy Warhols would be just fine playing for themselves. The vocals are mumbly, the lights are dim and you can\u2019t really hear the lyrics, but what the band does deliver with expert ease can only be called a vibe. It\u2019s their happening, but it actually doesn\u2019t freak them out.<\/p>\n

One doesn\u2019t attend The Dandy Warhols for the songs; you do it for the pure vibrations, and tunes such as \u201cYou Were the Last High\u201d hit you right in the sacrum (among other significant pressure points). The group had no problem drifting from the breathy \u201cI Love You\u201d to the pounding \u201cI\u2019d Like to Help You With Your Problem\u201d (one of the few off their newest, heavier-tinged record Rockmaker, which came out last year). Their laissez-faire, offhand delivery and evident enjoyment of simply grooving allowed a crowd of middle-aged dads and past-their-prime hipsters to plug into an energizing circuit that has been difficult to access since the \u201990s glory days of Deep Ellum.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

By mid-set, the band hit their stride, delivering a boppier section of songs that included \u201cNot If You Were the Last Junkie on Earth,\u201d \u201cGet Off\u201d and \u201cBohemian Like You\u201d with aplomb. After wrapping up the dreamy \u201cGodless,\u201d it seemed like this would go down as one of their best Dallas shows in recent memory, especially considering their last local performance at Ferris Wheelers in 2023 was rained out.<\/p>\n

And what is most consistent about a Dandy show is that anything can happen. In this case, it was a technical issue affecting McCabe\u2019s keyboard right at the finish line of the instrumental \u201cPete International Airport.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re so close!\u201d she cried as a roadie attempted to fix the technical issue. \u201cThis is what happens when you play with 1970s equipment.\u201d Promising, \u201cThis is gonna be so good,\u201d she tinkered with the knobs while the rest of the band cooled their heels on stage. Finally, McCabe just made it work, wrapping up the night with \u201cBoys Better\u201d from 1997\u2019s The Dandy Warhols Come Down with a shrug and an expert bang of her tambourine.<\/p>\n

Like other members of their generation who have made a point of seeming like they don\u2019t give a shit when they really care a lot, the Dandys just got on with it. Just like all other Gen Xers, as things glitch and fall apart, the band has learned how to adapt and pivot, rolling with the punches until the night is over. Perhaps not reaching the heights of superstardom, but never complaining, never explaining and never selling out.<\/p>\n

See more photos from Thursday\u2019s show:<\/p>\n

\"ManKula Shaker\u2019s Jay Darlington.<\/p>\n

\"KeyboardistKula Shaker\u2019s Jay Darlington.<\/p>\n

\"BandKula Shaker frontman Crispian Mills.<\/p>\n

\"\"The Dandy Warhols\u2019 Brent DeBoer.<\/p>\n

\"WomanThe Dandy Warhols\u2019 Zia McCabe.<\/p>\n

\"\"The Dandy Warhols\u2019 Peter Holmstr\u00f6m.<\/p>\n

\"ManThe Dandy Warhols\u2019 Courtney Taylor-Taylor.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Dandy Warhols with special guest Kula Shaker at The Kessler Theater on Thursday night. What\u2019s one more…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":258580,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5135],"tags":[5229,1596,12079,2136,4185,358,132131,3187,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-258579","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-dallas","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-dallas","10":"tag-nightlife","11":"tag-photos","12":"tag-rock-music","13":"tag-texas","14":"tag-touring-artists","15":"tag-tx","16":"tag-united-states","17":"tag-united-states-of-america","18":"tag-unitedstates","19":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","20":"tag-us","21":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115275954229103517","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/258579","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=258579"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/258579\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/258580"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=258579"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=258579"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=258579"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}