CMJ 2010, Day 2: The Drums bring style and swagger to NYC as they shimmy and shake

October 20, 2010, at Webster Hall

By Alexa Weibel
Published: October 25th, 2010 | 7:00am

Despite the press having shoddily lumped the Drums into the oversaturated ’60s niche on account of “Let’s Go Surfing,” the band managed to stand out from the crowd at New York City’s Webster Hall on Wednesday, matching their musical mettle with an infectious stage presence pumped with ample style and swagger.

Looking like a page torn from the Urban Outfitters fall catalog, the foursome took to the stage in button-downs, pegged pants, Chuck Taylors, and Oxford lace ups, poster boys for today’s super stylized Broolyn bands. But the Drums don’t fly on their boyish good looks and cute grade-school haircuts alone—they had audience members wrapped around their fingers by right of their sheer charisma and energy. Singer Jonathan Pierce fronts with a steely, blue-eyed gaze, but manages to connect remarkably with specta-tors, flinging himself about the stage, shimmying and shaking, gesturing and gyrating. Guitarist Jacob Graham manages to steal the spotlight with footwork as dexterous as his handiwork; waltzing, dancing, and lunging with his guitar, romancing it like it’s a dance partner. Though Pierce and Graham steal the show, they are backed by the able drumming of Connor Hanwick and plucky twang of secondary guitarist Tom Haslow, a quartet powerful enough to evoke rays of sunshine during their performance of “Let’s Go Surfing.” The audience smiled, sang along, and danced enough to make the floors shake—no easy ac-complishment with oft-jaded New York audiences.

One can only suspect Pierce and Graham attended their fair share of ’80s dance nights, as they ap-peared to have been plucked directly from a New Order music video and transplanted onto Webster Hall’s modern-day stage. While the Drums exude simple, catchy pop on their self-titled full-length, re-leased this past June, the music takes on greater depth when performed live, revealing post-punk sensi-bilities and 1980s dark wave appeal in addition to the shouted-about ’60s surf influences. The band cites the Smiths, Joy Division, Orange Juice, and the Wake as key inspirations, combining the elements into a product far greater than the sum of these parts.

Beyond their musical talent, the boys possess a significant amount of good old-fashioned charm. The well-heeled and well-mannered set enchanted with their extreme graciousness, profusely thanking audi-ences for making time for them in the mid of a busy CMJ week—a result, perhaps, of the thoughtful up-bringings of Pierce and Graham, who met as preteens at a Florida Christian camp.

Despite the hype surrounding their infectiously cheerful melodies, Pierce remains eternally grateful, and humble, too: “This is pop music, nothing more, nothing less. Thank you so much!” With an adoring fan-base merited for their rock star qualities yet down-to-earth appeal, the Drums are the reigning young men of pop, destined to steer clear of the brutal path trodden by so many disappearing one-hit wonders.

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Want more CMJ coverage? Check out our other articles here:

CMJ 2010, Day 1: Jean Grae dominates the dudes in a hip-hop battle

CMJ 2010, Day 2: Braids is one band to watch

CMJ 2010, Day 2: Better late than never

CMJ 2010, Day 4: Big Freedia brings some much-needed Bounce to NYC

CMJ 2010, Days 3-5: Go out with a bang