Kevin Bronson on April 19th, 2011

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Who: Best Coast at the Outdoor Theatre
In 3 or Fewer Words: “You.” “Oooo.” Repeat.
I’ll Remember This Forever Because: I never quite understood the heavy backlash against Best Coast/Bethany Cosentino and the simplicity of her lyrics – until now. After all, her band’s cute crisscrossing of ’60s girl-group pop with ’90s lo-fi, ’00s indie, and ’50s surf-pop tends to make for pleasant, if slight, listening. But after standing through a 50-minute 6 p.m. set in which BC trotted out a series of mid-tempo plodders about missing a boyfriend, wanting a boyfriend, being mad about a boyfriend, visiting a boyfriend or loving a boyfriend, while at the same time apparently not realizing that not every lyric sentence need end with the word “you,” I began to feel just as resentful as the growing chorus of Best Coast detractors. When the performance finally dovetailed into self-parody with new songs like “Gone Again” which ditched the word “you” altogether for a series of choruses which consisted only of a prolonged “oooooooooooo” sound, not even the peppering of admittedly great tunes like “Boyfriend” (yep, that’s the title) or the excellent Lesley Gore cover, “That’s The Way Boys Are,” could save what should have been a quick and forgotten noon set at the Gobi Tent.
What I’d Tell My Friends Who Caught Death From Above 1979: Sigh. Don’t even tell me.
– Travis Woods
Photo by Timothy Norris/courtesy of LA Weekly