Dum Dum Girls at The Button Factory | Review

Dum Dum Girls in The Button Factory on May 10th 2014

The giant outline of a loveheart dominates the backdrop in The Button Factory tonight. Were you feeling it? Kristin Welchez, aka Dee Dee Perry, has been the driving force behind Dum Dum Girls since 2008, when she was recording and releasing tracks by herself in DIY fashion. There’s some love for starters. Tonight sees them visit Dublin off the back of third studio album ‘Too True’, a New Wave-y, shoegazey concoction that married overcast ‘80s pop with California sun.

Speaking of married, here’s some more love to throw into the mix. Tonight’s support comes from Crocodiles, the San Diego band based around Charles Rowell and Perry’s husband Brandon Welchez. From Neon Jesus onward, the key words here are reverb, delay and echo as the duo channel practically every mid-‘70s CBGB’s alumni and drag them through the decades, calling in The Jesus & Mary Chain and Spiritualized along the way.

Bedroom guitar posturing antics abound, Johnny Thunders looms large and they are joined by a third guitar at one point to add another coalescing layer to an engaging, if derivative, performance. Perry joins them on vocals for I Wanna Kill, a final fuzzing JMC takeoff with that bassy drum machine coming on loud. The guitar effects peal on after they leave the stage, repeating and droning, leaving you to wonder whether you have just witnessed homage or pastiche.

The loveheart comes alive with a blue LED outline, and flashing bouquets adorn three mic stands stage front as Dum Dum Girls – Dee Dee, flanked by Jules and Malia on guitar and bass – go straight into Bedroom Eyes. Some fella has replaced Sandy on drums, and there’s another fella playing lead guitar behind Jules. They put forth a demeanour of line-towing stoicism and you have to feel for them, dressed up like man-dolls in fishnet vests. The attire may of course be their own choosing, although their expressions suggest otherwise – but then who knows? No-one is smiling onstage tonight.

I Got Nothing delivers one of many passionate performances from Dee Dee, and while the first few ease us in with some fine retro pop, a snappy I Will Be takes things down a darker side alley. The band’s influences are apparent, from Siouxsie through Patti, but then Perry has never hidden that. He Gets Me High maintains the garage pop tone, and as enjoyable a gig as it is thus far, it’s impossible to tell what the band make of it so stony is the façade onstage.

Dark, Spector-inflected numbers take over the mid-section of the set and Perry switches between guitar and tambourine, stock still at the mic in anticipation of the intro beat to Lord Knows. Pale Saints’ Sight Of You speeds things to a close, with nary a word spoken or a laughter line cracked through the lot. This is rock’n’roll, serious business, and it’s clear Perry regards her craft as such.

Her final outburst on a measured Coming Down is the most startling vocal performance of the night, those elongated notes delivered with brow furrowed, climbing from the song’s restrained momentum. It’s one final mesmerising moment in a night of many, even if there seems to be a veil that separates the band from the crowd; mesmerising, sure, but somewhat removed at the same time. Despite the warm layers of guitar and melodic fuzzed up pop that swells through the entire set, there is a detached coldness that even a giant loveheart can’t dispel.