Less Than Jake at the House of Blues in Anaheim

Home icon Home»Concert Reviews»Less Than Jake at the House of Blues in Anaheim

Written by Brittany Woolsey

Tuesday, 22 February 2011 22:52

The smells of weed and spilt beer filled the air of the Anaheim House of Blues on Monday night as punk-ska outfit Less Than Jake performed to a nearly-sold out and diverse crowd.The quintet was hilarious throughout the night. As soon as they smelled the chronic in the air, Chris Demakes (vocals) acknowledged the scent.

“They’ll toss your ass out for smoking cigarettes, but you can get away with something illegal,” he said. “There’s no more need for Californians to go to a sketchy dude’s house to buy weed anymore.” He continued, “Do you think Walt Disney is stoked that you’re smoking pot in his building?”
Opening with their song, “Shindo,” Less Than Jake delighted the audience, who responded with a mosh pit of skanking and dancing. Throughout the night, the crowd was constantly moving and no one was standing still.

“You guys are pretty good for a bunch of stoned people,” Demakes said. “It’s gotta be better than a Good Charlotte pit.”Less Than Jake also played some of their more well-known songs like “Look What Happened,” “Conviction” and “All My Best Friends are Metalheads.”While the band played a majority of older songs, they also delighted fans with songs from childhood, which they recorded for their latest album, “TV/EP.”
“We’ll be honest. We know our old shit is our best,” Roger Manganelli (bass) said.

The audience became nostalgic as Less Than Jake performed themes from “Animaniacs,” and “Scooby Doo.”
Before playing the theme song of the iconic 1970s mystery cartoon, Demakes told the audience that the song was about “a bunch of people who got stoned and took a bunch of acid in a van.”

“Does anyone like semen in the room?” Manganelli asked the crowd before the band broke out into a horned-up version of the “Spongebob Squarepants” theme.

Along with hits and covers, Less Than Jake also took requests from the crowd, particularly from an interviewer, who requested that they play “Pete Jackson is Getting Married.” The group mentioned that it was their first time playing it on tour, as well as the first time in over a year, but they did a fine job and didn’t seem to miss a beat.

Shortly after, Less Than Jake broke out into their “authentic ska song,” “How’s My Driving, Doug Hastings?” They said that even though they are from Florida, they are always mistaken for an Orange County ska band because of this song, and also, possibly jokingly, because, “Buddy slept with Gwen Stefani in ’89.”

After that song, the band played around with more audience interaction, acknowledging everyone in the top floor of the venue. They paid particular attention to a duo of fine-looking women, who the group urged to “show their tits,” but they declined. However, that didn’t stop one other girl from popping one of her boobs out of her red v-neck T-shirt. “One tit is better than nothing, honey,” Demakes joked before breaking out into their final song of the evening, “Plastic Cup Politics.” White confetti sprinkled onto the crowd as the band played, which seems to have become a staple for many show conclusions at the HOB.

The audience urged for an encore, chanting random things like “Justin Bieber,” and, of course, “Less Than Jake.”

Demakes returned onto stage with his guitar to perform “Rest of My Life” for an encore. The other members later joined him as artificial snow was blown onto the stage and into the crowd, turning the HOB into a sort of Winter Wonderland.

The group concluded with two of their most popular tunes, “The Science of Selling Yourself Short” and “The Ghosts of Me and You.”
Before exiting the stage, Demakes acknowledged the crowd’s never-ending energy despite it being a Monday.

“It’s people like you who makes this possible for people like us,” he said.