Dan Deacon, Sept. 17, Starlight Ballroom

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Dan Deacon, Sept. 17, Starlight Ballroom

POSTED: Tuesday, September 18, 2007, 4:15 PM

Filed Under: Music | Show Last Night

Dan Deacon fans are skull fuckers: Deacon, who you can't see in this photo, is somewhere in the vicinity of the green skull with Sean Agnew (directly beneath skull).

Photo | Brian Howard

"Chill vibes… chill vibes… the people around me are my friends… the people around me are my friends…"

Dan Deacon had to take several time-outs during his spaztastic set at the Starlight to ask the crowd to chill, stop crowding him and to actually dance rather than just push side-to-side. "With apologies to Pearl Jam, knock this fucking moshing shit off," he said, or something to that effect, before asking the crowd to repeat "Chill vibes" ten times, then "The people around me are my friends." He wasn't angry. You get the sense this is par for the course for Deacon, the maniac, electronic-grooving freak-folk artist from Baltimore who plopped himself down on the floor in front of the Starlight Ballroom stage beneath a flashing green pole-mounted skull and ripped into a gadget-driven set of bleeps, bloops and video game anthems. He invited kids up on stage do dance behind him (these 50 lucky souls were likely the only ones in the audience save the circle right around him on the floor who actually got so see Deacon). The set, interrupted only by a brief equipment failure (this is what happens when you invite the crowd onto the stage) was like one big epileptic seizure, sort of an ADD rave, as Deacon ripped through new faves like "Okie Dokie" and "Crystal Cat" and kids danced around like fidgety Charlie Brown characters. When Deacon announced he'd be ending his set after what seemed like only 30 minutes (but was probably longer) the enclosing throng booed, prompting Deacon to "extend" his set with a rendition of "Wham City" (video after the jump) that killed, aided by the fact that everyone in the audience seemed to know every word.

Video and more photos after the jump.

Beach party or Dan Deacon show?

Photo | Brian Howard

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Featuring everything from event roundups to concert reviews and sex talk, City Paper's Critical Mass is a space for off-the-wall coverage of Philly's A&E scene.

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