Those Darlins & The Strange Boys - The Earl, Atlanta

So last night, in lieu of seeing Best Coast at the Drunken Unicorn, I went and saw the second show of the two-night stand of Those Darlins at The Earl, and honestly, I think I came out the better for the choice.

Those Darlins are a three-woman band that rocks hard and plays punk-ish garage rock with a southern twang. They're from Murfreesboro, Tennessee, just outside of Nashville, and if you can't get to see them play in Nashville itself, Atlanta's probably not a bad place to watch them comfortable in their own environment.

The speed and volume of their set last night aren't even hinted at in the video above - I selected the above only for the clarity of the picture and its overall audio quality. The band doesn't have any official videos out yet and most on-line vids are fairly low-quality, hand-held, iPhone recordings. But then, there's always this:

In any event, they were marvelously entertaining. It wasn't at all what I was expecting - I was thinking something more along the Americana lines of Mumford and Sons (a British band, oddly enough), but with daughters instead of sons. Instead, I got a kick-ass set of straight-ahead rock and roll performed by three young, party-hardy women. They walked right up to the edge of the stage while they played, stepping over the monitors and strutting like confident rock stars, and even got down into the audience at times while they still sang and played. They flirted with the crowd and guys in the audience brought them shots from the bar, which they gladly downed. Rock'n'roll, in all its decadent glory. Looking back, it would have been great to hear them at The Star Bar - I think they would have appreciated the Elvis shrine there.

The Strange Boys opened for Those Darlins. I saw The Strange Boys when they opened for Spoon at The Tabernacle back last March. At the large Tabernacle, I was only able to see them from the distance of the first balcony, so that they looked like little stick figures on the large stage, but at The Earl, I was able to stand in the front row, a mere five feet from guitarist and lead singer Ryan Sambol.

Ryan has a quirky, unusual voice, arguably one of the great voices in current rock music. It's interesting to hear how much more comfortable he seems to be with his singing than a mere six months ago, allowing his voice to crack and twist as it wants. Also, when I last saw them, they didn't have sax player Jenna Thornhill DeWitt with them. She played with the band last night, nicely filling out their sound.

Local band Gentlemen Jesse and His Men opened the night ("We're from just around the corner") with a bunch of songs reminiscent of early Twist and Shout-era Beatles. All three bands proudly played in the three-chord, garage-rock tradition, and will tour together up the East Coast, playing the Bowery Ballroom on September 16, before going their separate ways following a two-show date in Philadelphia. Those Darlins will continue to tour with Turbo Fruits.