(photo taken in NYC, not DC, and lifted from Flickr)

Who’d a thunk it? Power ballads at the Black Cat?
I still haven’t made my peace with the Hold Steady’s new CD, “Boys and Girls in America.” As I wrote about a month or so ago, it’s a little too earnest, too REO/Mellencamp. But seeing a band live is almost always a truer way to figure out what they’re all about than listening to their recordings, and I must say last night’s show at the Black Cat was one of the best I’ve seen in years.
Simply put, it was rapturous. There was none of the chin-scratching, stand-offish coolness common at indie rock shows — the band delivered an expansive, professional set, and the sold-out crowd went bonkers. I was up front and center, getting jostled and stepped on, loving it. I went alone, as Meg was sick and I couldn’t scare up a date, but didn’t feel alone as folks were very friendly. Wide-eyed high school kids pressed against the stage, giddy college kids, good-natured frat boys, old crusties like me, everybody singing along with Craig’s twisty lyrics. A great bunch of people to be part of.
Because I was so close, the sound was pretty muddy so I couldn’t hear everything that was going on. The keyboards seemed more restrained, less frilly than they do on the new record, and Tad’s guitar playing called for lit cigarette lighters held aloft in tribute. They drink Budweiser and Jim Beam onstage, straight from the bottle. No poncy bottled water for these rockers.
The focus of this band is completely Craig, who has developed into a charismatic frontman, even though he looks like the Verizon “Can You Hear Me Know” guy with a wicked hangover. In between shout-outs to old girlfriends, he paid tribute to Minnesota Twins slugger and AL MVP Justin Morneau (”my favorite Canadian”) and catcher Joe Mauer (”I spend more time thinking about Joe Mauer than I do thinking about most people I actually know”).
They opened with “Stuck Between Stations” from the new CD, followed by “The Swish” from their first, but it seemed that the bulk of the set was drawn from “Separation Sunday.” The encore was devoted to power ballads, delivered straight and touchingly.  The final two — “How a Resurrection Really Feels” and “Killer Parties” — stretched out for a good 15 minutes, ended only when the band pulled about 30 people up on stage to drink their beer and knock their mic stands over.

When you’re trying to reach people, play songs that they want to learn every word to, earnestness beats snotty irony every time. It’s a lesson the Hold Steady has figured out, and it’s great to see them taking it to the bank.