A Giant Dog Shakes Off the Blues at Fond Object

Thursday could have been a very dreary night indeed for rock ’n' roll. There was, of course, the torrential downpour as the remnants of Hurricane Harvey spiraled across the Southeast, as well as the lingering sadness over the loss of Fond Object co-owner Jeff Pettit. The memorial show on Tuesday at the shop's original East Side location was a superb send-off to the friendly Austin, Texas, transplant known as "El Jefe," but the scene at the store's downtown expansion was still on the quiet and somber side when we shook off the raindrops and strolled in on Thursday, joining the early birds who'd come out for A Giant Dog's show. The Austin five-piece's life-affirming and cathartic set, which we'll argue is some of the best rock ’n' roll you're going to hear and see anywhere, proved to be exactly what we needed to get back in the groove.

Around 8 p.m., Nashville’s most outlandish punk-leaning outfit, Spodee Boy, took the small checkered stage and tore into their whiplash set of oddball post-punk — after they announced that they were Faux Ferocious. That move seemed a little silly, but they did a superb job of shattering any lingering gloom with a set that was just right, bashed out in about 20 minutes without a lull in the action.

After a quick changeover, the real Faux Ferocious was ready to pump the jams. Constantly morphing and improving, Faux has reached a point in their evolution where their sound lands somewhere between The Feelies, The Damned and Can. They stunned the soggy-clothed crowd with their ability to wander between far -out jams and pandemic-level infectious hooks.

Those sets did a great job of representing the swirling currents of Music City rock, but it was time to give the people what they wanted. We remember our first dance with A Giant Dog, way back in 2011 when they stopped at the legendary DIY spot Glenn Danzig’s House (RIP) with only one gnarly EP under their belt. In the years that have passed, the group has released four LPs, including the raucous and philosophically complex Toy, which just dropped last week, and done some heavy road-testing of their ballistic rock show. During that time, they've perfected a kind of tightness that lets them remain in perfect control of the pandemonium they unleash. Setting up on Thursday, they looked ready to take on the whole world, starting with the damp and dedicated records nerds in attendance.

Each song was like a top spinning on a rough surface, gyrating and wobbling and bouncing before finding the exact right place to crash. The united vocals of Sabrina Ellis and Andrew Cashen charged ahead of the rolling thunder of the rhythm section. The kids loved it, as dancers down front shook and hopped to the spring-heeled effervescence of Toy jams like “Get Away” and “Bendover.” The band even dipped into their back catalog, whipping out old favorites like “Sex & Drugs” and “I’ll Come Crashing.” But the biggest reaction came from their punked-up cover of INXS‘s “Don’t Change,” spurring a few back-of-the-room dwellers to rush up to the stage to shout along with the rearranged Aussie anthem.

Walking away from a set that ferocious, we had the distinct feeling that this might be our final opportunity to see A Giant Dog on anything but a giant stage (though there was that time Eagles of Death Metal rocked out at Fond Object downtown). But every time we see ’em, they do us right in so many ways — wherever they go, we'll be sure to follow.