Many of the music pantheon's favorite bands are terrible live, and that's okay. For example, Aphex Twin's show is as exciting as doing your taxes while watching C-SPAN on mute, but it's totally safe to call him one of the most important musicians of the decade. His work is defined by ambient tones and dense textures that are intended for a cozy chair and big headphones, so being disappointed by a slow Aphex Twin show is like watching a boxing match and being upset by the violence.
Nonetheless, when your band's schtick is pain and/or suffering, inner demons and emotional catharsis, you had better have a good live show. If a band has built a career out of melodies that wildly careen out of control and vocals abrasive enough to grate cheese, it cannot be content to play its songs and call it a night. Even thrashing around on stage is not enough. By definition, active, dynamic music needs to be active and dynamic live or it fails.
By this rubric, Omaha's Cursive is one of the best live bands on the planet. On stage, the four-piece, who will play at the Somerville Theater on Saturday night at 8 p.m., somehow manages to both maintain its tempestuous mix of liquid rhythms, searing, guitar-led melodies, and explosive vocals and still deliver precise, fully intelligible performances.
Part of this phenomenon is attributable to experience. Debuting in 1997, Cursive has quite simply played so many shows that the band knows how best to play its songs. Still, much more of this phenomenon is rooted in Cursive's consummate musicianship. Since Cursive's debut, drummer Clint Schnase, bassist Matt Maginn, guitarist Ted Stevens, and guitarist/vocalist Tim Kasher have virtually immunized themselves from getting tagged as an "emo" or "screamo" band by using their instruments in myriad and creative ways. Unlike similarly noisy and emotive bands, Cursive drastically varies song structures and tempos - occasionally within one song - and has hollowed out a sound that is distinctly its own.
This is particularly true of Schnase, who drums like he isn't content to just keep time. On "Lament of Pretty Baby" from 2000's "Domestica," his taut rhythms keep Kasher's climactic confessions from peaking too soon, but his wild fills ensure that they peak high enough.
Perhaps, unfortunately, in what has to be one of the most bizarre venue choices in recent memory, this loud, chaotic, seasoned quartet has chosen the intimate Somerville Theater to host the only Boston-area date on their tour in support of this year's "Happy Hollow." The 92-year-old venue, which has also hosted quiet evenings with Sufjan Stevens, Devendra Banhart and Tortoise, does not seem like an appropriate place to see Cursive.
The acoustics are good and the stage is relatively low, but the seats are fixed to the ground; so much for dancing the pain away. Also, half of the audience has to sit on a balcony; so much for rubbing elbows with like-minded strangers.
Still, a band this good - both on record and on the stage - has certainly earned the benefit of the doubt. Feel safe in assuming that someone in the band's camp knew what they were doing when they decided on the Somerville. In the end, for performers as good as the members of Cursive, it doesn't really matter where they play.
