Lennon @ Sin-e

This past Saturday night I was once again in the city to cover an event. This time around it was to see female rocker Lennon and her band play a set at Sin-e (which I’ve been told is pronounced Sha-nay, don’t ask me why or how, but I was alerted to this the first time I asked “you know where Sin-e is?”). Lennon is an aggressive singer who can currently be seen opening up for Aerosmith and Motley Crue on their tour. This particular show was done during a short break in the touring action and was well worth the nearly two and a half hour, yes you read that right, two and a half hour trip to SoHo to see her. Did I mention the J train can bite my ass?

I arrived at Sin-e at around a quarter to nine and was greeted by a new contact person (gotta love meeting the contacts) and Lennon herself, both of whom were smoking cigarettes outside the front door. Before anyone gets into a rant about how singers shouldn’t smoke this is a rock show and a rock singer, she’s not warming up to do Phantom, she’s warming up to belt out a set of loud “you better get my fucking point” music. She can have her cigs. After a brief conversation that somehow got onto the topic of her tour bus having no porn on it (I think there was disappointment all around on that), we all headed inside for her to start the show. Looks like I had arrived just in time, though as I told her, if I wanted to boost the ego I could just say they were waiting for me.

As a female lead singer with an all-male band Lennon is doomed to be saddled with a very unfair comparison to Evanescence’s Amy Lee. Truthfully, being a dope female lead singer with an all-male band is the only thing these two have in common. While Lee plays the role of the seductress, beautiful, coy and even seemingly fragile at times, Lennon, is more reminiscent of a Lita Ford / Joan Jett type. As she looks out into the crowd her vibe screams “I know I would be the greatest fuck of your life, but if you piss me off I will punch you in the face.” This is actually very sexy in its own right. For all that’s written about wanting more strong women on stage Lennon is someone who doesn’t just toe, but stomps on the line between sexual and strong without exploiting her sexuality.

It didn’t take long for me to let my inner headbanger out and really enjoy Lennon’s set. She’s not just a talented singer, but she also has personality on stage. She stopped a few times to talk with the crowd, at one point commenting that her biggest issue on that night would be keeping her breasts in her bra. This was something I felt I should keep my eye on, but alas, they stayed in.

Lennon’s band is filled with a mix of radically different personalities. One of her guitarists, Tex, is a tall, lanky guy with very wild hair and equally wild tats. Her other guitarist looks like what would happen if one of the carpenters from a TLC program was really into The Cure. The group’s bassist looked like he could have been at home rockin a show on The O.C. and the drummer was crazy, but aren’t all drummers crazy? At one point the bus driver hopped on stage, grabbed a guitar and Tex took the lead belting out an awesome rendition of AC/DC’s “Dirty Deeds” (though I still have that very funny picture in my head of Neil Patrick Harris doing a karaoke version of the song on “How I Met Your Mother”). While Tex was doing this Lennon hopped off stage and grabbed a beer. That’s right, A BEER! How can you not like this woman?

After Tex finished rocking his AC/DC classic Lennon jumped back on stage to close the show. Afterwards I had the opportunity to speak with her again and she was just as personable as before. The conversation was a quick one, though, as I hoofed it to make it up to the Bleeker Street station to hop a 6 train (which was right there waiting for me!) to get back to Grand Central. I caught the train, and was backing Fairfield at 12:45am, but the night was young and I had a goal. I drove to Bear and Grill and caught the last half hour of DJ Halo’s set there. That’s right, I hit up two shows in two states in one night! That’s gotta be some kinda record. Heck, even if it isn’t, I still think it was pretty awesome.