Whatever happened to the Hives, the five-piece band from Sweden known for wearing matching suits and being part of a so-called garage rock revival trend that made a splash in the early-2000s, along with acts like Detroit’s White Stripes? It’s been more than a decade since the group last came through these parts, at a venue that no longer exists (Clutch Cargo’s).
According to the elaborate backstory for The Death of Randy Fitzsimmons, the band’s first studio album in 11 years, released this summer, the Hives were reeling in the wake the death of their Svengali manager, who allegedly put the group together when they were just teenagers and wrote all their songs. In reality, there is no Randy Fitzsimmons; the Hives were dealing with various crises including financial mismanagement on behalf of its bookkeeping company that resulted in a court ordering the band to pay $3 million to fellow Swedes the Cardigans and a surgery and lengthy recovery for drummer Chris Dangerous. The band continued to tour when it could, including a 2019 Australian tour with AC/DC. Somewhere in there, there was also a pandemic.
With a new record to sell, the band has embarked on a U.S. tour of mid-size venues, including a stop at Detroit’s 400-capacity El Club on Saturday. The packed crowd, made up largely of millennials and Gen Xers, ate up hits like “Hate to Say I Told You So” and new songs played live for the first time, punctuated by frontman Howlin’ Pelle Almqvist’s unparalleled stage banter. (Choice cuts: “We are performing very admirably”; “Detroit, you are taking this rock ’n’ roll like the desert misses the rain”; “What’s the biggest venue in Detroit? We could have played there if we wanted to.”)
“That one sounded rough in soundcheck,” he said of one of the new songs. “But just at the crucial moment when we needed to, we all pulled together. I’m sure there’s a lesson there somewhere.”
Like the White Stripes, the Hives have always had a postmodern vibe, toying with ideas about artifice and authenticity while at the same time cranking out undeniably fun back-to-basics rock ’n’ roll anthems. And at times, Almqvist could seem like a walking parody of rockstar cliches, as if he had a quota of well-rehearsed cues to hit, from cautious mic twirls to awkward crowd surfing. That’s the beauty of this band, though. They never set out to reinvent anything — but only to have a good time doing it, and to do it in impeccable style.
Olivia Jean — a homegrown act with her own penchant for rock ’n’ roll style, and who married the White Stripes’ Jack White onstage at a concert at the Masonic Temple last year — opened the show.
Subscribe to Metro Times newsletters.
Follow us: Google News | NewsBreak | Reddit | Instagram | Facebook | Twitter
