Handsome Furs live at Home Club, September 18, 2009 (Photo by: Yong Chern Han)

Last Friday, I went to Home Club and caught Handsome Furs in action. After attending all those huge outdoor concerts with mainstream bands lately, watching an indie band in a small club was mighty therapeutic for me.

And the Furs didn’t disappoint. Hailing from Montreal, Canada, Dan Boeckner and Alexei Perry are a husband-and-wife duo that plays a mean mix of electro-punk. The pair had wanted to tour Asia for the longest of time and were pretty psyched to close their Southeast Asia tour in Singapore. The hour-long set, with songs culled from their last two albums (Plague Park and Face Control), was intense and the air was abuzz with the electrifying chemistry and fiery passion between the married couple. Watching the Furs do their thing, you realize that music doesn’t always need that flamboyancy of fancy stagings, lights and visuals. It can be bare, minimalistic, intimate and like I always like to say, deliver a gusty punch to your face.

Alexei and Dan - Their sex is on fire! (Photo by: Yong Chern Han)

And two-piece bands always seem to be able to do that. Maybe it’s their simple setup and the lack of distracting frills. You’ll just have to capture the audience’s attention from the get-go with your music. It’s more real and honest, in a way. I’ve seen The White Stripes (five times across three countries – they are my favorite band of all time), The Kills and The Black Keys live and they all have one thing in common – the strong connection between the two members and the way they are able to share it with everyone else in the room. This whole topic of duos making the biggest sound on stage has been beaten to death since Jack and Meg took the world by storm but to me, it still bears repeating. And I relish the fact that members of the Kingdom of Two club can say this to each other: “It’s just you and me against the world, baby.”

Such mawkish romanticism. Maybe I will start on another blog post about The Power Of Three, which is something that Jack White firmly believes in as well.