No one seems to be able to adequately describe Viva Voce, aka Kevin and Anita Robinson from Portland, Oregon. The Heat Can Melt Your Brain is apparently all over the map, and occasionally the duo will change up gears multiple times within a single song. This, of course, will garner them comparisons to the Fiery Furnaces. But Lovers, Lead The Way! also got Viva Voce comparisons to Mates Of State, who seem about as far away from the Fiery Furnaces as you can get without, say, lapsing into death metal territory.

None of that is really all that important; what is important is that the band can not only play a whole collage of styles, but they can do it with an impressive amount of ability in a live setting. “Alive With Pleasure” works amazingly well live, especially considering the cooing vocals over most of the song—Anita can actually project in concert. But perhaps the coolest thing about this track live is that Anita also pulls out the double-necked guitar for it. Awesome.

Sleater-Kinney seem poised to return with a vengeance, if Saturday’s Vancouver show is any indication. When I saw the band on the One Beat tour, they seemed battle-hardened and weary; the only song to leave a real impact was “Sympathy,” the best album-ender Sleater-Kinney’s written thus far.

I’m glad it now appears to be a staple of their live show, because last Saturday’s rendition was even better. In fact, if there was a difference between this show and the one I saw two years ago, it’s the level of enthusiasm. As a one-off show before the release of The Woods, the Vancouver gig was more a chance to play in front of a crowd again, and it was obvious they missed being away from the stage. All the old material came off ace, and there’s lots of interesting new material as well—if you’ve resisted downloading the leaked version of the album like I have, you’re in for a bit of a return to the Call The Doctor days if Corin and Carrie’s vocals are any indication.

All in all, the Vancouver show was probably the best show I’ve seen them play, even beating out the 2000 Toronto show they played with the White Stripes opening. May 24th can’t come soon enough.