BAEBLE CONCERTS: Tigercity at The Mercury Lounge

Four white boys take the stage. One of them – the singer – wears a suit. The others are informally dressed, sporting t-shirts and striped polos that wouldn't be out of place at a sporting event. They look unassuming. They look quiet. They do not necessarily look like their music could incite mass dancing and widespread booty-shaking.

Then the music starts. The guitar sounds bright, clean, and trebly. The bass is fat and funky. The vocals are sexily high-pitched, much like Prince. The audience immediately begins to dance, almost as if the music commands them to. And for the next forty minutes, those quiet-looking boys in Tigercity will be the most commanding funkmasters this side of the 1970s. Who would've thought?

There are other bands that play this kind of music, but those bands ham it up. They wear bright costumes, or grow Bee Gees beards, or find some other way to rely on spectacle as much as musical talent. Tigercity is different, and there's no fabrication behind this quartet's style. They just want to rock. They just want to be funky. They just want you to dance.

Tigercity has caught a bad case of Saturday Night Fever, and the only cure is a massive dose of funky guitar, falsetto vocals, and disco-beat rhythms. So give 'em a listen, check out this performance from the Mercury Lounge, and get down with Tigercity's disease.

Play that funky music, white boys.

- Andrew Leahey