Best Band Stage Show

During a CD release performance at Fitzgerald's earlier this year, Middlefinger lead singer Matt Kelly asked the crowd in between songs for the correct pronunciation of the name "G-O-E-T-H-E." Whoever answered first would get one of the Middlefinger CDs Kelly held in his hands. After getting nothing but quizzical looks, Kelly, a wheatstalk wearing thick black eyeglass frames, asked again: "G-O-E-T-H-E." "Ger-ta," a concertgoer blurted, as if she had just unraveled a trigonometry equation in her head. The response prompted Kelly to launch one of the jewel boxes in the direction of the answerer. Whatever connection the band thought it had with its crowd at this point looked a little strained. As "Ger-ta" wrote in Faust: "Man still must err, while he doth strive." So, yeah, five-year-old Middlefinger still has much to work out in its stage show. But a decent-to-bad Middlefinger show is most likely better than anything else going on at the same time in Houston. Sudden tempo changes, clean yet raw punk sound and Kelly's too-cool-to-be-choreographed moves -- like the one in which he boinks himself on the head, sinks a couple of inches, then pulls himself back up to full height by the shirt collar -- make for engaging entertainment. And no one's asking you to sell your soul for the pleasure.