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It is quite unusual to see three rock bands nobody ever heard of before last year nearly, fill a 5000-seat hall on a weeknight, but that is exactly what happened Wednesday at Winterland, where Elvis Costello, Mink DeVille and Nick Lowe performed.
If nothing else, the concert demonstrated the flexibility of the so-called New Wave school of rock. The styles ranged from Costello's angry young man invectives, and Mink DeVille's Latin-influenced New York rock sounds, to Nick Lowe's decidedly slick, hard-driving rock 'n' roll.
It was Lowe, in fact, who provided the high point of the evening in his San Francisco debut. Burning through his half-hour opening set (no encore), Lowe spat out songs in rapid order with no less than a drumbeat in between selections.
Bassist Lowe was joined by guitarists Billy Bremner and Dave Edmunds, the latter a well-known recording artist. Like rock bands such as Creedence Clearwater, Lowe and company geared their concert sound to closely resemble recordings. Jackhammer rhythms drove home tunes like "Heart of the City," his closing number, or "I Knew the Bride."
Mink DeVille, the six-piece band led by lead vocalist Willy DeVille, followed Lowe with an hour-long set concentrating largely on tunes from DeVille's debut LP of last year. Despite some pedestrian instrumental parts and arrangements, Mink DeVille played with verve and zest, regardless of Willy DeVille's wooden stage presence.
Costello capped the show with a power-packed performance that easily topped his two previous Bay Area appearances. His three-piece band sounded razor-sharp, and Costello gave the performance definite point and focus, moving through the program with a fine sense of pacing.
In addition to tunes from both his Columbia Records albums, Costello performed a number of as-yet unrecorded tunes. By changing his repertoire as often as he does, Costello keeps his show alive and fresh — even to devotees who have seen all three Bay Area shows in the last seven months, since he made his U.S. debut at the Old Waldorf.
The three bands completed a joint U.S. tour Wednesday, and the combination was a winning one. Not only did each group offer a unique and satisfying performance, but the overall picture of the current rock scene created by the three up-and-coming acts looks quite rosy.
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