Highline Ballroom
New York City
Words by Diane Cohen
Photos by Abbey Braden

In taking a break from touring with festivals Lollapalooza and All Points West, Mates of State headlined a handful of shows, including one at the Highline Ballroom with opening acts Takka Takka and Telepathique. The crowd was, as is ever the case at Mates’ shows, so warm and amiable that the mood of the audience seemed to be a dance-party reflection of the mushy looks of adoration exchanged on stage by Gardner and Hammel (a note to Ms.Gardner and Mr.Hammel: please stop loving each other, creating such wildly catchy music and having adorably-named offspring, or I shall be forced to go the the wizard and seek a heart).

Joined on stage by brothers Anton and Lewis Patzner of “string metal” band Judgement Day the duo played a set that both filled out and improved upon some of the Mates’ older songs and reinvented selections from the group’s newest album, re-arrange us. Renditions of Fraud in the 80′s, Proofs, and Goods (All in Your Head) kept to the book, but some things need not be messed with.

Other things, however, reacted well to tinkering. Like U Crazy grew itself a violin solo at the end, Get Better concluded with a string duet from the brothers Patzner, and a drum solo created a new coherence between Think Long and You are Free. All in all, the Mates’ seem to have developed a new love for interludes. The highlight of the show came during the quartet’s performance of Re-Arrange Us. Bringing new richness to the song’s originally frenetic pace and high-energy chorus, the addition of guitar, cello, trombone, xylophone, piano, and tambourine filled out an already-fun song and was well received by the crowd.

Even when opening act Telepathique invaded general admission to engage in a round of hat frisbee that lasted through three of the Mates’ songs, no punches were thrown, deserved or not.