CSS proves to Chicago there is life after “Hot, Hot Sex”

December 14, 2008, at the Metro

By Selena Fragassi
Published: December 17th, 2008 | 5:35pm

“I have work for you — it’s a Stylista challenge,” said Lovefoxxx, the pint-size ring leader of Brazilian musical circus CSS as she threw a bag of colorful balloons into the cramped crowd at Chicago’s Metro. “Whoever can blow up the most balloons and toss them in the air will become a junior editor at Elle. You’ll even get an apartment in Manhattan.”

It’s funny that Lovefoxxx would bring up fashion on this particular night. Dressed in a bombastic African spirograph-print unitard and tattered headdress that looked like a Lion King The Musical reject, Lovefoxx seemed more fit for a Betsey Johnson haute couture runway. With the spot-on mix of Harajuku and cartoon character, all cameras instantly pointed to her proving that even behind the camouflage of such a wild outfit, you can’t hide such a unique personality.

It’s no doubt that Lovefoxxx’s Björkian presence carries the band, but aligned on either side of her was the backbone of the quintet’s musical credibility that has led them to be called one of the “biggest bands ever to come out of South America” by The Guardian. Already, the estrogen-heavy group — at a ratio of four girls to one guy — has become the highest-ranking Brazilian band on the American Billboard Hot 100 charts with the single “Music is my Hot, Hot Sex.” Featured on its self-titled debut, Cansei de Ser Sexy (Sub Pop), which translates to “got tired of being sexy,” the track became another Apple success story when it catapulted the group to front-page news after being featured in a commercial for the iPod Touch.

Although the hit was one of the fan favorites of the night, the show was filled mostly with cuts from the group’s summer release, Donkey (Sub Pop), including the single, “Left Behind,” “Jager Yoga,” “Rat is Dead,” Let’s Reggae All Night,” Beautiful Song,” and “Air Painter.”

Driven by heavy bass and drum lines and steered by contagious repetition, each track was a likable song-and-dance number that got stamped on forehead memories with seals of approval.

It’s a shame openers Ssion couldn’t take a clue from their tourmates. Hailing from Kansas City, the quartet, who mistakenly dubs itself as a punk prototype, got lost somewhere in the haze of its own noise pollution as it punctuated covers of Iggy Pop’s “Nightclubbing” and songs about womanizing with screams for the uninspired crowd to “get crazy” and buy its albums so the members could keep doing drugs. But that’s what happens when your band becomes all about your heavily made-up frontman who rises like a dictator on his elevated floral platform to preach about “street jizz.”

Thankfully, the slyly charismatic Lovefoxxx saved the night as a true showman with a flying cup of celebratory confetti as she jumped in to crowdsurf like the animal she is.

For more photos from this show visit Venus Zine's Flickr page.

CSS feature

Review of CSS' Donkey