By the end of last night at the Fillmore, CSS’s dynamic lead vocalist-party rioter Lovefoxxx was stripped down to a black tank top and ripped up jean shorts over fishnets, her raccoon eye makeup smeared across her face, fluffed pink hair electrified out of its sockets.
She had cartwheeled, stage-dove, danced through the crowd trailing the mic, spit liquids like a fizzing fountain across the stage/herself/the audience, and told us all “I love you” a half dozen times, requesting that we should shout “I love you” back in manly intonations. For what started out as a calmer evening, with rumored low ticket sales, the show grew into a massive all-out punk rock dance party by evening’s close. My cheeks hurt from smiling.
Even openers MEN, who unfortunately had to work with a far smaller and less worked up audience in the early stages of the show, were working it it overtime, lead vocalist-electronics-shifter JD Samson hopped from mic to synth to laptop, and raised her tattooed arms, sporadically jumping into high-kicks to get the crowd going.
10 great bits about CSS and MEN at the Fillmore:
1. Lovefoxxx screaming “Fuck Everything” in a faux-growl before kicking off the jam, aptly titled “Fuck Everything” off the Brazilian rave-punk band’s new release, La Liberación, an album that takes one tiny baby step away from electro and one towards reggae-beat.
2. Before jumping in to (arguably, its biggest hit) “Music Is My Hot Hot Sex” off its self-titled debut, Lovefoxxx telling the crowd she’s single, and introducing her slightly-embarrassed guitarist-cowbellist Luiza Sá as also single.
3. The revelation that “Let’s Reggae All Night” is CSS’s least requested song. The band then ripping it open and tearing it apart, cementing its place as a future live request.
4. Before MEN’s song “Make Him Pay,” JD explaining “It’s about feminism and the economy.”
5. JD asking, “Who here has eaten a burrito today?” Then seeing a show of hands. We do love our burritos, San Francisco.
6. Lovefoxxx grabbing the glasses of a toe-headed stranger (?) and trying them on for show.
7. The audience and artist call and response during MEN’s “Who Am I?” — “Who am I to feel so free?” “Who am I?”
8. The life-sized cartoon cut-outs of cute-dressed people (presumably odes to other collective members, including Johanna Fateman) on stage with MEN.
9. The kindergarten pink construction paper hearts attached to CSS’s amps, keyboards, and affixed to guitarist Ana Rezende’s shirted boobs.
10. Lovefoxxx. All of her. The glittered fox mask, stripping to fishnets and ripped shorts, constant mic swinging, drink-swilling, cartwheeling, butterfly-dancing, crowd-surfing punk princess goodness. She’s the electro-Brazilian Wendy O. Williams.