REVIEW: RAINBOW KITTEN SURPRISE @ ROADRUNNER 5/14

Photo Credit: Jimmy Fontaine

Review by Kate Poe

Last Tuesday night at the Roadrunner, Rainbow Kitten Surprise delivered a highly anticipated and electric performance, featuring a lively mix of new songs and old classics, energetic movement, and a guitar solo off a beer bottle. 

Rainbow Kitten Surprise, affectionately shortened to RKS, is well known for their poignant lyrics and indie alternative sound dominated by eclectic rhythms, often featuring unexpected tempo shifts and vast, genre-blending instrumentation. The band’s new album, Love Hate Music Box, takes on a more pop feel than their old tracks. While the band’s discography ranges from acoustic and intimate to full bodied, their lyrics remain consistently compelling and profound. 

Before the release of Love Hate Music Box, the future of RKS seemed uncertain. The band exchanged their extensive seven week 2023 tour, canceled almost one year ago, for a modest eight date show series. Fans seemed eager to savor this opportunity to see RKS after a quiet year, and the venue was packed well before the show started on Tuesday night.

The night opened with indie folk artist Ethan Tasch, who delivered a pleasant and groovy set. According to Tasch, this was the largest room he’s ever played. He opened with “Hold Up,” his most streamed song on Spotify. Between songs, Tasch was conversational and quiet, much like his music. He told the crowd how he thrifted his belt that day and how the last venue he played was a library. His voice is soft and angelic, dipping into expressive, deep notes.

He reminded the audience early on to drink water, citing heat emergencies from the night before, and event staff passed water bottles back into the crowd. Tasch played a short but optimistic tune titled “Present,” saying, “That’s my happy song, does anyone want a depressing one?” The crowd cheered. But during “Good News,” Tasch stopped quickly after fans alerted via phone flashlights of a person in the pit needing medical assistance.

Despite the (pun intended) hold up, he continued the set and wrapped up with a delightfully plucky song, “Come Onn,” that featured Tasch on harmonica. When I spoke with Tasch after the show, he identified this closing song as his favorite.

“The harmonica comes out and everybody knows what’s up, right away.”

Tasch has a headline tour coming up in June, and though he isn’t stopping in Boston, he cheerfully invited fans to take the train down to New York or DC. 

Around 9:15, the lights dimmed and the geometric Rainbow Kitten Surprise logo lit up the room, suspended above the stage. The crowd roared as the band entered to a low electronic beat. Ela Melo, the lead singer, stunned in a pink tulle skirt with black bows in her long blonde hair. She placed herself in the center of the stage, with the rest of the band (Darrick “Bozzy” Keller on guitar and vocals, Ethan Goodpaster on electric guitar, and Jess Haney on drums) forming a semicircle around her. 

RKS announced back in March that they would be playing a different setlist every night with a mix of new tracks and old classics. The band opened with “Fever Pitch” from their 2018 album How to: Love, Friend, Freefall before moving onto older songs. The colorful lights matched the abrupt rhythms of the song and the audience knew every word. Melo jumped as the music and lights cut as if she vanished from the stage entirely.

RKS’s performance simply captivated the audience. Ela Melo’s voice had an impressive range, switching from resonant tones to higher registers in a beat, and the live show only broadened her emotional and expressive range. Her eclectic and fervent dancing complemented the unique and iconic timbre of her voice, which included jumping, spinning, kicking, and floorwork after falling to her knees, completely entranced. The performance was perfectly feminine, eccentric, and syncopated–perfectly Rainbow Kitten Surprise. 

After “Drop Stop Roll,” Melo thanked the audience for being there, saying it has been a crazy last few years and that it is good to celebrate something “communal.” She described Love Hate Music Box not as a “consumer opportunity,” but instead as a culmination of six years of “hard work for us to bear our souls for you.” 

The crowd bellowed along to RKS classics like “Cocaine Jesus,” “Devil Like Me,” and “Goodnight Chicago.” But as the band transitioned to newer songs, the pop sound from the new album felt a bit restrained. The instrumentation shifted from staccato-driven and emotive to a sleek and guarded routine. Despite this, the crowd was equally as pleased; any RKS is great RKS, and the band delivered each song with the same infectious high-energy effort. 

The rest of the band complimented Melo’s energy. Darrick Keller ventured often to the center of the stage to duet with the lead singer, and drummer Jess Haney beamed a smile that could be seen from the box office throughout quite literally every single song. During the penultimate song, “Run” from RKS the album, Ethan Goodpaster ventured to the front of the stage to rip on his electric guitar with a Budweiser bottle. 

Ela Melo joked about how the band was going to leave, and we all are going to cheer, and that they’ll be right back for the encore. Like most of their music, it was refreshingly honest, and sure enough, the band came back after a minute or so of chanting and cheering. During “Bearwalk,” the heat struck again; the song had to be stopped and restarted due to another medical emergency in the pit. The band wrapped up with their top song on Spotify, “It’s Called: Freefall,” and the room reverberated every word in a devotional chorus. For those in the crowd who waited years to see RKS, like myself, the performance was (pun intended) all that and more.