So, The Diggs' final residency show (plugged below) on Friday was by far the standout of the four (er, the three that I was fortunate enough to be at). Gotta give it to them for putting together one hell of a bill. I missed Dirty Perfect, but walked in in time to catch Heads Up Display... and fell almost instantly in love with them -- not because I've had adventures traipsing around the LES with one of the band members, but because they feed off of my weakness for good powerpop. (honestly, I've had enough of The Plus Ones. Haven't we all?)

I had the opportunity to see the newly reborn COMA, who evidently decided they no longer wanted to be COMA, so they underwent a name change procedure and stood on stage before us Friday night as "Unlove". They totally pulled a Prince on us.
Funny, two weeks ago they were still COMA. I guess since then they've, uh, experienced an "awakening" and decided a re-christening was in order.
< / lame joke>
Still fronted by a singer with a haircut like a pixie and a voice like a banshee (not the tone-deaf kind), this band is too surreal. Surreal enough to be called COMA still, yes (but Unlove is fine too I suppose).

Friday night drew in a good turnout for The Diggs -- not record-breaking, but good. I slunk outside to take a call about a minute before they were due to take the stage and when I returned, I had to plow through the small drove of fans that had collected in the hallway, all lined up at the door to see The Diggs tear it up.
Now, you know I'm a sucker for good lyrics. And The Diggs, if I've never touched on this before, have a way of incorporating into their lyrics poignant expressions of the most universal human sentiments. After "you make me wanna die", (courtesy of the only band able to wear the abstract monosyllabic band name effectively into the 21st century) I was skeptical that I could be similarly impressed by any song again, regardless of lyrical brilliance. But with lines like "your blood is in my veins", The Diggs win. Their management team fears it is Tim's knack for lyricism that will attract an unwanted demographic and bring about the band's downfall. But see, "I Wanna Be Adored" never produced anything of a reaction within the angst-ridden teen community (maybe in Europe though?), so I'm optimistic. (After all, you don't get a whole lot of typical prozac poster-child types singing it through the streets, do you?)
This band's live performances get better every time I see them. Although to my dismay, the drummer didn't break anything this time. I know, I was disappointed too.
I am shamelessly stuck on them. Not a bad band to be fixated on, you know.
...even if 2/3 of them do live off the beaten hipster path the Curbed map. (the other one lives near me, in uberhip musicianville Brooklyn.)

But that last band, they were really my fortunate discovery of the night. Though not as well received as The Diggs (to say the least), they were something remarkable. Damn shame that the place pretty much cleared out by the time Two If By Sea were set up. Few of us stayed around (a tragedy) despite being encouraged to do so by Tim himself, but all who did were blown away. The unanimous opinion -- at least, among the remainder of the substantial crowd that accumulated during The Diggs' performance -- seemed to be that they were much, much too good to be playing to ten people (thirteen tops). Vocals like The Killers in their cheekiest of moments + Faint-esque magnetism + keyboards like Big City Rock. Yum. Mindnumbingly catchy stuff. It's a pity they belong to Baltimore, they need to come back to us. Like, soon.
One of these days they will break out (in a big way. I'm talkin' Bloc Party proportions). So love them while you can still afford not to hate them.