Last Night: The Sounds at Fitzgerald's

Photos by James Bricker

​Aftermath wasn't sure whether the tank top that Maja Ivarsson was wearing last night was meant to be ironic or not. It didn't really matter anyway; when the Swedish, platinum blonde lead singer came to the stage with The Sounds, every red-blooded American in the audience had to catch their breath for a moment and we felt it.

When we arrived at Fitz, Limousines, an electronica duo from San Francisco, was already opening. The crowd was impenetrable and made up of people who looked like they'd scribbled Sounds lyrics inside of their planners while they were high school freshmen.

​That's the power of Swedish new wave; it doesn't die after nine years and four studio albums, it lives on and becomes nostalgic. One of our friends even showed up to Fitzgerald's around 7:30 p.m to ensure that he had a place in the front "to take good pictures." Yeah.

The Sounds took the stage at 10 p.m., about an hour earlier than we expected. It's been two years since their last album and they're touring the US on Something To Die For, released in March. Even though we didn't want to make the comparison because of the towheaded frontwoman, the band reminded us of Blondie.

Since 2002, the group has released four albums, but last night they stuck to their most recent release, which they produced themselves. They played six of the ten songs on the album, each song more electronic and synth-y than the last.

The crowd didn't seem to mind; in fact, it seemed like most of them were up to date, singing the lyrics with the indulgent Maja. When we heard everyone screaming the words to the title track, we assumed it might have been from their first record.