Today’s Musing: Late Night Music Performances

Last night on Letterman, they replayed the episode from July 1 where St. Vincent performed “Marrow”.

This is my second exposure to St. Vincent after the “Actor Out of Work” video.  I couldn’t help feeling that the weakest part of the Letterman performance was St. Vincent herself…the music was certainly excellent, but the verses of the song had an unfinished vibe and her whole thing seemed too hip for words.  And speaking of the words, there’s something to be said about intentional attempts at weirdness.

Then on Craig Ferguson, Glasvegas performed “Daddy’s Gone”.

Beyond the completely lifted fashion sense of the band, I felt this performance was totally underwhelming, not to mention you can’t understand half of what’s being sung – even allowing for thick accents.  I’ve seen other Glasvegas performances (when researching for my Austin Events blog last week) and somehow they seem incongruous when compared to this.

All of that said, I’m not writing off either of these artists before I listen to their full albums.  There was just enough to catch my ear in both cases.  What do you think of these performances?