Rainer Maria

Mercury Lounge, New York, October 2, 2003

Just another Rainer Maria show. Ho hum. Hardly.

The band has been touring for close to three years straight, traversing the country and back home to Brooklyn. And no matter how long it’s been, how many shows that have come before, or how many shows are coming after, one thing is certain. This band is playing as if this is it—the last show of their near decade-long career.

The band plays tight but with abandon. It’s as if in their pre-game warm-up instead of piling hands and shouting “go team,” they pile hands and whoever’s on bottom grips a third rail of electricity. The charge causes the three to clench and operate as one—the energy is so raw that it’s impossible not to be caught up in the current.

Singer/bassist Caithlin DeMarrais pleads for her life in her lyrics, but always goes out with a bang and never a whimper. So loud and yet so dear. She possesses the unique ability to scream melodically. Her voice, and indeed the band’s sound, shrinks and swells like a tidal wave. It’s the Sundays struck by lightning, incessantly.

And I haven’t even mentioned Kyle yet.

Kyle Fischer is the guitarist. His axework matches the urgency and intensity as DeMarrais’ vocals, but with the unadulterated joy of an overstimulated child prodigy. He leaps about the stage as if in the throes of a fit inspired by a Baptist faith healer. He dances and sweats and leaps, and soaks the first three rows of the audience with his sweat. He paints notes like Jackson Pollack, flailing against the guitar with no possible semblance of order, until it becomes clear that he’s created this reverberating craggy rockwall of sound that is part The Edge, part Billy Corgan, and entirely more fun than either.

Bill Keuhn’s drumwork is mesmerizing. You can’t take your eyes off him. A syncopated Stewart Copeland with the focused rage of Jimmy Chamberlain.

Midway through the set, Kyle Fischer’s pit stains had conquered the rest of his shirt. The show took place on the first cold night of autumn, and Fischer remarked that this was the only time he could remember wearing a long-sleeve shirt on stage, which by this point was completely imbued with sweat. The simple plight of two layers too many. DeMarrais smirked, “The first day of fall will getcha…” A little homespun wisdom which you’re entitled to share when you’ve finally made it back home. Without permitting pause for reflection, however, Keuhn had already begun counting off the next number with his sticks, and they were off again.

The band’s best offerings of the evening were all from Long Knives Drawn, including “CT Catholic,” “The Double Life” and “Ears Ring.” As always, the band unveiled a few brand new songs. They’re prolific enough that they could probably crank out an album a year if it wasn’t for the constant touring.

“Rise” from their second album, Look Now Look Again, began the encore (“I’m laying in the soil / Is it time for me to rise?”). A sole reprieve from the aural onslaught that comprised the rest of the set, this song hushed the once revved audience to the point you could hear a tear drop. As if the band was saying, “We can break your heart as fast as we can rock your world.” And come on, at the end of the day aren’t those the two reasons we listen to music in the first place?

How do they do it? It’s impossible that three people, only three, can render music this big and important. I’m no Rush fan, but all of a sudden, I can relate. It’s amazing that music can be played so loud and fast and still retain its pure beauty. When an audience is so amped they need to “come down” after a show, you know the band is doing something right.