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PRINCETON — There was no bad luck for rock fans at Princeton University's Dillon Gym on Friday the 13th. Elvis Costello and the Rubinoos put on a show filled with contrasts, similarities and only partially repressed hysteria.
Both acts, presented by McCarter Theatre, featured a selection of tough, danceable rock songs, building audience reaction to a fever pitch. Yet the cute and cuddly Rubinoos were quite a contrast to Costello's stark and sinister image.
When Costello came on stage, the audience immediately stood. The crowd surged forward, overwhelming all efforts of the beleaguered security guards to keep the aisles clear. Costello leered at his audience and sneered through an approximately hour-long set, predominantly composed of songs from his hit Armed Forces album.
The crowd, already stirred up, nearly went hysterical at such musical indictments of emotional fascism as "Accidents Will Happen," "Two Little Hitlers" and "Oliver's Army."
The audience was full of Costello freaks, who knew all of the depressing lyrics yet found the music an inducement to dance. It is truly a weird effect to find people dancing to music by this evil looking runt on stage, who is slyly singing about the fall of civilization. It is almost as if Costello is pulling a private joke on us all.
The highlight of the evening came during the tune he called "The Secret Weapon," a steamy song accompanied by a light shining through a drum which cast eerie shadows across the gym.
Other songs performed included "Watching the Detectives" and "Radio, Radio." His first big hit, "Alison," was conspicuous in its absence.
In keeping with his tradition of breaking traditions, Costello did not return for an encore, although his fans clamored for more than 10 minutes.
The Rubinoos, a young group of rock 'n' rollers from Berkeley, Calif., opened the show with high energy songs and a touch of '60s nostalgia. The group took the stage with a rousing a cappella tune called "Dancing Through the World." The extremely young band members looked as though they should have been playing a high school dance. But their tight harmonies and fast paced material — including the Beatles' "Please Please Me," The Ventures "Walk Don't Run" and "Telstar," and Tommy James' "I Think We're Alone Now" — were very well executed, gaining enthusiastic support from an audience primed for Costello.
The only badly executed portion of the Rubinoos set was a protracted encore of The Archies' "Sugar Sugar" — during which sugar cubes pelted the stage — coupled with the psychedelic oldie, "Pushing Too Hard."
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