First, a correction: I got some bad information about Matt & Kim's quasi-straight-edge status. I heard a rumor, and I'd never seen them drinking, so I figured it was true. But they drink, or at least Kim does—I guess I've still never seen Matt drink.
The last time I saw the contagiously happy couple was at an all-day warehouse party in Brooklyn, playing to a massive, manic hometown crowd. The last time they saw Seattle was during last December's blackout-inducing windstorm, when they played to an insanely overcrowded basement at Camp Nowhere.
Part of the fun this time was going to be in seeing how well they could translate the energy of shows like those to the disparate environments of Sing Sing and the Vera Project. The latter is, of course, a safe, sober, all-ages venue; the former is a drunken hipster-and-hiphop dance party. Matt & Kim seem to work best in spaces where those divisions aren't quite so strict, like at that warehouse show, where alcohol and all-ages were allowed to mix.
After catching John Tsunam and Clipd Beaks at Gallery 1412 on Friday, I arrived at Chop Suey to find the place practically empty just before 11:00 p.m. For whatever reason, it seems to be the magic hour, before which it's just impossible to get people out to a club. But, as usual, by the time Matt & Kim went on a half hour later, the place had suddenly filled up. As for translation, the band had nothing to worry about. The lively Sing Sing crowd worked itself into a pogoing, sweaty mess as the band sped through their songs. Total number of stage dives: two.
Over breakfast at Coastal Kitchen the next day, Matt, Kim, Clayton and Alpha Vomero, and Franki Chan (who runs their L.A.–based label, iheartcomix) traded stories about Andrew W.K.'s party-hard positivism, getting lost at South by Southwest, and visiting weird New York steak houses. At one point, Kim called a friend and mistakenly referred to the restaurant as "Cosmic Breakfast," which would actually be a pretty sweet name. Afterward, the out-of-towners stopped by Sonic Boom, where the band browsed the records and Chan checked for mentions of the band and his label in the magazines.
That night at the Vera Project was, to put it mildly, more restrained than the previous night's festivities. After I missed disco instigators Little Party and the Bad Business and Olympia's Two Ton Boa, 31Knots made for an awkward opening act. Their proggy, post-hardcore noodling and weak theatricality (a devil mask, a book—possibly a bible—and some goofy outfits) seemed totally at odds with the headliner's easy pop hooks and stripped-down stage presence. But Matt & Kim quickly got the crowd going, despite a brief mic problem and Matt's constant coughs. "I got the wrong kind of cough syrup," he said. "What's it called? An expectorant." Total number of stage dives: zero. 
