Modern English  put the punk back in post-punk at The Radio Room Greenville

It’s easy to forget, or for the latest generation of Modern English fans, to be even aware of the fact that Modern English was one of the foundational bands of the post-punk/new wave (recently christened “darkwave”) movement. Their 1981 album Mesh and Lace is a masterpiece of goth guitar sounds (not synths), apocalyptic lyrics, and smart commentary on waves of late Cold War-inspired nuclear annihilation anxiety. The dense atmosphere of that album rivals that of The Cure’s Pornography. Yes, Robbie Grey and company went on to write the deceptively happy pop hit “I Melt With You,” but remember–Robert Smith too wrote songs like “A Strange Day” and then dumped “The Lovecats” on us. Balancing out the gloom and goth–doom with some (again deceptively happy) pop music will maintain one’s sanity though. Modern English’s current live show thus balances the psyche quite well, while hinting at an interesting musical future for the band, which is great news for a legendary act that has been around for over 40 years. 

Modern English took the stage at The Radio Room to a background screen playing images that fell somewhere between a 1960s-like student film and post-human extinction alien-found footage of the last clouds, sunsets, and crows ever filmed by homo sapiens. Over these images, the repeated alarm-filled declarations that usher in their song “16 Days” played on a loop. “Danger! Hold Everything!” and “A satellite that can count the seeds of an apple? Working feverishly on the atomic bomb!” interspersed with insane laughter faded into the first few bass notes of the song played by founding band member Michael Conroy, a founding member who continues to play with the vigor of a man 20 years younger than he actually is. As the song mushroomed into its dark wave/post-punk glory, the Modern English fan who was there for more than just the ubiquitous playing of “I Melt With You,” or even “Hands Across The Sea,”  knew that they were going to be rewarded with something much more. Yes, Robbie Grey was his usual gregarious self, bantering and laughing with the too-young-to-remember-the-80s, Bettie Page wannabe screaming fans up front, but as the band rolled through several cuts off of Mesh and Lace, Modern English fully established that they were there to actually rock, and reinject the oft-imitated darkwave sound they helped create with some of what made it so appealing in the first place: punk rock and riff guitar. 

Having seen Modern English approximately 7 years ago at The Radio Room in all their synth-pop glory, I was pleasantly surprised with the stripped-down, tight and lean, and unabashedly punk-leaning instrumentation the band reveled in this time around. Loud, screeching, riff-heavy guitar, intermixed with a heavy dose of psychedelically atmospheric guitar noise carried the band’s sound. The only synth heard (and visible) was a tiny unit off to the side of the stage that was used to help create some of the more chaotic sounds that pop up in many of their darker-edged songs. Somewhere mid-set, the band upped the rock reclamation vibes with new songs, “Not My Leader” and “Long In The Tooth” (both off their forthcoming new LP).  Straight-up punk power chords propelled both of the standout new songs through the band’s raucous rendition of them. Filling in for original guitarist Gary McDowell, Gabriel Sullivan, who is a highly talented guitarist and songwriter in his own right, did a phenomenal job recreating the intricacies of Modern English’s early songs, then perfectly recreated the latter pop guitar sounds of a bevy of tracks off of After The Snow, the forever resting place of the aforementioned, sing along, only-song-casual-fans-know hit, “I Melt With You.” 

When the band finally got around to their nightly sing-along, most of the early set dark wave nuclear anxiety had dissipated from their set, almost. “I Melt With You,” given new life as the soundtrack to the scene of Steve and Nancy’s swimming pool antics in the first season of Stranger Things, isn’t necessarily the happy sing-along love song we all envision it as. Perhaps I’m a little too dialed into the darker side of Modern English’s music and theatrics, but stopping the world and melting with someone sounds inherently frightening in this new age of nuclear tension where post-Soviets act like old Soviets and rattle their nuclear saber. It feels like the paranoid android in the Kremlin would be happy to “melt with you” after stopping the world in its tracks if he can’t successfully gobble up his nation-state neighbors like his old Soviet heroes did. 

Mesh and Lace has inspired rock acts from U2 (see “Numb”), to Smashing Pumpkins (see Machina and Cyr), to Radiohead (see Kid A), but the opening band for Modern English, Gainesville, Florida’s CHIMES is inspired unabashedly by the aforementioned Modern English contemporary, The Cure. Fronted by Mike Magarelli (Sunshine State) and comprised of former members of Against Me! among others, CHIMES, in Magarelli’s own words, “…is basically an unapologetic attempt to emulate/pay homage to The Cure-primarily Disintegration era,” and they do so exquisitely. Loud, rolling drums and interchangeably atmospheric and slicing guitar notes bathed in moody synth tones propel CHIMES into musical territory only their heroes can emotionally take a listener. With only two officially released songs, CHIMES left me desperately searching for more to listen to via my iTunes and Spotify accounts (I finally found more tunes by them on their Bandcamp site). Thankfully, like Modern English, they will be releasing a full album soon, sometime early in the new year according to Magarelli’s comments between songs. Two new albums to combat the post-holiday blues will be the perfect remedy for the January blues. 

(Greenville, SC has been lucky enough to have its own top-of-the-line venue, The Radio Room, which hosted Modern English twice in the last decade, along with some of the best talent in rock, country, and every genre in between. With their impending move to a larger location, The Radio Room will only grow while continuing to bring the best national and local acts to Greenville.)