The lineup — singer-guitarist Cosentino; guitarist-bassist Bobb Bruno; and ex-Vivian Girls drummer Ali Koehler — was as capably compact and stripped-down as the material, the bulk of which was drawn from “Crazy for You,’’ save for surprises such as a frisky new number, “Sunny Adventure,’’ and covers of Loretta Lynn’s “Fist City,’’ and Lesley Gore’s “That’s the Way Boys Are.’’ Interestingly enough, the latter two seemingly incongruous songs — Lynn’s classic country confrontation with a man-stealing interloper contrasted with Gore’s suburban teen dream pop confection — suited the band well, and showed just how far back Best Coast’s aesthetic touchstones go.
Although less reverb-drenched than the echoing walls of sound that surround her in the studio, Cosentino’s lithesome voice nevertheless evoked a strong whiff of alt-country siren Neko Case on the back-to-back pining pleas of “Our Deal’’ and “I Want To’’ — that is, if Case sang Brill Building-penned, girl-group songs about summer in 1963 and indulged an unhealthy obsession with Phil Spector. The band’s catchiest number, “Boyfriend,’’ about waiting by the phone and yearning for a boy out of reach, emitted a sweetly guileless wonder you couldn’t help but wish would last a little longer. It even sounded like a headlong crush. All songs should be like that.
As brash as they were, Wavves, a San Diego trio led by singer-guitarist Nathan Williams, were considerably less satisfying as a live proposition. An assortment of beach balls continuously kicked from, and tossed to, the stage (the band’s latest album is called “King of the Beach’’ — get it?) accompanied Wavves through a smudgy blare of a set that, at 50 minutes, was about 25 too long.
Williams put all of his creative cards on the table with the bratty sub-punk opener, “Idiot,’’ which telegraphed much of what was to follow. The songs — “No Hope Kids,’’ “Green Eyes,’’ and the closer, “Post Acid’’ — were mostly devoid of dynamics or distinction, sounding instead like carbon copies of one another, curdling amid Williams’s reedy range and a grating screech that sounded as if the kid’s Game Boy had been taken away.
Montreal-by-way-of-LA’s No Joy opened the night with a heavy half-hour set — a shoegaze-and-sludge-layered cake, really — devoted to an endless fascination with guitar fuzz, distortion pedals, and My Bloody Valentine.
Jonathan Perry can be reached at roughgems@comcast.net.
