Shearwater. Picture not from last night.

Last night I ventured to the Doug Fir for the Clinic/Shearwater show. The two bands are nothing alike and each have amassed their own legion of dedicated fans. I can’t imagine any of those fans overlapping, but each band put on a confident, theatrical set that showcased their individual strengths.

As Shearwater took the stage, they turned on some lights on the floor that shone upward, rather than using the overhead house lights. This gave their set a stagey, vaudevillian ambience. It also gave me the impression they weren’t blinded by the lighting—as bands often are—and could clearly see into the audience. Their set began with Jonathan Meiburg singing a capella with his booming, theatrical voice for an uncomfortably long stretch, but he soon began plucking his banjo and the band launched into “Red Sea, Black Sea.” And what an unconventional rock band they were, with Kimberly Burke on what I can only call a mini-upright bass—it was the height of a full-sized upright bass but made with only about 30% of the wood—and long-haired drummer Thor Harris on a ragtag kit that included an old bass drum held together by rope and a furry tom tom. In between songs, Thor (who, with his long blond braided hair and hairy, muscular arms, looked like a Thor) drew his bow across a vibraphone to create ambient, droning, bell-like sounds. On one tune, the mighty Thor busted out a hammered dulcimer, which is a really cool-sounding instrument. With a couple other fellows in tow on keyboards and assorted trinkets, the band resembled nothing so much as a troupe of misfit music teachers.

It was a showcase for the moody, confrontational songwriting of Meiburg, and the music ranged from quietude to bombastic turmoil, often within the same song. I enjoyed quite a lot of what they were doing, and Meiburg picks durable, interesting chord changes—often in modal minor keys—that allow melodies to contour themselves to naturally. The band played remarkably well, with every note in place and no missteps; it didn’t seem at all spontaneous, but it possessed power. It was a little surprising, then, that they chose to end their set with a brief, dissonant hopscotch, with each member playing random squeals and runs on their instruments. Shearwater takes the dark elements of Okkervil River (of which Meiburg was, until recently, a member) and blots out all the hopeful assuring qualities, for a brackish, folksy stew that hits on a very deep level.

Then Clinic took the stage, and I can’t imagine odder bedfellows for a shared bill. Shearwater is arty in a museum kind of way, whereas Clinic plays minimalist trash rock, their only concession to artiness being the steadfast insistence on wearing surgical masks while they play. The masks were present (and the singer’s had a convenient mouth-flap), and they all wore awful Hawaiian shirts which made them all look like seedy bartenders from Cocktail 2: Stirrin’ It Up!. Clinic has a reasonably lengthy history and a sizable back catalog with which I am not familiar. Their earlier stuff seems to have earned the band genuinely dedicated fans, but overall, a lot of their music sounded similar to me. Their best moments sounded like trashy B-sides from long-forgotten bands in the ’60s. Some of their repetitive grooving got a little dull, but they kept the tunes short and punchy.

Lead singer Ade Blackburn jumped between guitar, organ, and melodica (out of which he got an echoey, spooky tone, no small compliment from me considering the melodica is perhaps my most hated of instruments). The band played for about 35 minutes, then took a short break—what seemed like a typical encore break—but when they came back they played at least five more songs, maybe more, before leaving for the actual encore break, after which they returned for a final pair of songs. The pacing was odd, but effective. Some of the one-chord thrashings reminded me of better songs by Archie Bronson Outfit, another, newer British band that may very well have been influenced by Clinic. None of Clinic’s songs really grabbed me or moved me (but I admit the riff from “The Witch” is still echoing around my brain today). Still, the masked lads from Liverpool kept me on my feet and my head moving.