Escaping the grip of an impending winter in Wisconsin, a primarily young crowd packed The Rave Thursday night to see Brooklyn indie pop duo Matt Johnson and Kim Schifino, otherwise simply known as Matt & Kim.
Patiently waiting for sound check to end, fans chit-chatted about their favorite albums and broke into improvised dancing, but when the lights dimmed their attention immediately turned to the stage.
Strobe lights began to flash and thunder could be heard rumbling from the speakers as it contended with the roar of the crowd. The energetic duo took to their instruments and broke into "Block After Block," the opening track off of "Sidewalks," during which Schifino had no reservations about standing atop her drum kit to shake her hips and dance, working the crowd in to a frenzy. Johnson was just as bold, jumping, kicking and nearly doing complete handstands on his keyboard.
After the first song, Schifino climbed onto her drums once again and simply wrote off Milwaukee's chilly weather stating that "It may be cold outside, but that's okay because we're all going to get hot and sloppy tonight!" This set the tone for the night as the crowd jumped, danced, clapped and sang to many of the hits, such as "Good Ol' Fashioned Nightmare," "Red Paint," "Now," "Yea Yeah" and "Cameras."
Leaving no room to breathe between songs, Matt & Kim would often throw out balloons and confetti as they danced to several hip-hop beats of Kanye West, Kris Kross and Ludacris, even seamlessly implementing other obscure beats into their own songs. When they weren't doing that, they were usually complimenting the crowd and flattering each other.
Schifino assured the crowd that they were the craziest group they've performed for and even stated that "It's Matt's fault that we keep skipping over Milwaukee, blame him. I think we need to do this more often." Eventually Schifino took a moment to break the jubilant atmosphere to talk about the need for people to adopt stray pets. Milwaukee animal shelter Happy Endings had a table set up in the lobby with more information and a means to donate.
After slowing things down for a brief moment with "Ten Dollars I Found," Schifino took to the crowd, literally standing on their hands and dancing while Johnson tossed out more confetti and jammed on his keyboard to provide the soundtrack to Schifino's dance spree. They quickly broke into fan favorite "Daylight" and fresh hit "Lets Go" while finishing the set off with "Lessons Learned."
But, the crowd wasn't satisfied and craved more. The power duo happily obliged, sending the crowd off with "Good For Great" and leaving Milwaukee in a trail of sweat, balloons and confetti.