In a nice contrast fromt the hipster-noodling of Cymbals Eat Guitars, James and I ran over to the side stage to catch Hardly Art’s The Dutchess and the Duke in our second act of the day.  We’ve heard the buzz behind these guys and were excited to see what they were all about.  Full disclosure, we hadn’t heard a track until we walked over to their set.  The first thing you’ll notice is that the picture’s aren’t really of high quality.  Oddly, all but one of the 5 piece were wearing dark shades even though the skies here in Chicago are beginning to cloud over and promise rain.  Dudes didn’t need shades to hide the sun, but the attitude exuded from the music made the sunglasses the perfect accessory.

The Dutchess and the Duke impressed us with a half hour of their brooding hybrid of contemplative Americana rock.  Often times, the band shifts back and forth between melancholy balladry and upbeat folk-style rock.  Several times throughout the set they turned up the volume and went after it vocally.  Guitarist and second lead vocalist Kimberly Morrison worked perfectly in tandem with frontman Jesse Lortz.  The wickedly dark imagery and lyricism were backed nicely with some off-beat antics on stage.  Namely when the keyboardist held up huge cue cards so the crowd could sing lines like “I’m feeling alright,” “Building Castles in the Sand,” and the school appropriate, “We’re all gonna die.”

To put it bluntly, the band absolutely killed to the pretty big audience on Stage B.  Excellent percussion, big hollow-bodied guitar soloing, church-organ electronics, and tandem vocal roundabouts slaughtered the audience for a short 40 minutes.  The band brought in violins to gracefully juxtapose the reverbed minor chord guitar work.  It ain’t quite rock, it ain’t quite folk, but it’s certainly worth a spin around the block.  The band plays at The Hideout tonight in a big Pitchfork afterparty along with Vacations.   We’re posting on the fly but we’re having a blast.  When a dude weilding a big ass guild guitar asks me with a sneer, “If I’m on fire, why am I so cold,” I’m intrigued immediately.  Check out their release through Hardly Art and if you haven’t caught them live, get off your couch tonight Chicagoans.  Well worth it.