If taking 11 years off helps a band’s sound as much as it did for Crowded House, perhaps every band needs to take an extended hiatus.

Crowded House returned to New York City for the first time since 1996 on Thursday night for a brilliant performance at the Masonic Lodge. The band played in the stately Grand Lodge, a room better known for housing meetings of the usually secretive Free Masons than as a venue for a rock band.

All photos by Adam Kaufman

The private show was being filmed for a concert series called Artists Den, which features musicians playing in small beautiful rooms that aren’t usually associated with music. High-definition cameras were everywhere, but I never felt they hindered the performance. There were probably 200 people in the space that holds 1,200, leaving plenty of room for everyone to dance.

Read on after the jump for more of Scotty’s review and Adam’s photos…

The lights went down at about 8:45 when multi-instrumentalist Mark Hart sat down at the ornate pipe organ located in the balcony of the room. Hart played a beautiful passage before his bandmates came on stage to start People Are Like Suns. Hart ran downstairs and joined the rest of the band for the rockin’ tune off of Crowded House’s latest album Time On Earth.

There would be plenty of songs from Time On Earth scattered throughout the 120-minute set. I have listened to the new album two or three times, and nothing’s really caught my ear. But the live setting gave all of the songs an energy that is missing from the recorded versions. She Called Up had me kicking up my heels, propelled by the driving beat drummer Matt Sherrod was laying down. Even slow tunes such as Nobody Wants To and Heaven That I’m Making sounded fantastic live. I actually liked the new tunes better than the classics during the course of the show.

And there were plenty of classics throughout the night. The set featured many songs from the band’s epic first three albums. Something So Strong, Don’t Dream It’s Over and Mean to Me – all featured on Crowded House’s eponymous debut album – sounded just as fresh as they did 11 years ago. Better Be Home Soon and When You Come represented 1988’s Temple of Low Men, while Four Seasons In One Day and Fall At Your Feet from Woodface were all played really well.

Two things really stuck out: The first is the laid-back family vibe that Crowded House emits. Neil Finn’s son Elroy played guitar on a few tunes, as Neil’s wife Sharon sat close to her men. And Finn’s other son Liam will be appearing as the opening act at many shows on their upcoming tour. I’ve never seen a band with as much clever banter as Crowded House. Finn and bass player Nick Seymour spent the whole set telling jokes and relaying anecdotes. I’ve been to so many concerts where the band plays their set and leaves with nary a word. It was refreshing to see a band that clearly liked interacting with their mates, crew and audience.

Matt Sherrod’s drumming was the other revelation of the evening. I had seen Sherrod play with Beck last year, and I knew he is a motherfucker on the kit. He was a constant whirl of motion, providing a steady and strong backbeat for all the songs. Sherrod’s work on She Called Up was especially stunning, as he quickly moved the tune from punk to reggae. Believe it or not, these guys can jam: Matt has only been playing with Crowded House since February, so I can only imagine how good they will sound by the end of their upcoming tour.

Usually at an industry gig, the crowd’s response is lukewarm. That wasn’t the case on Thursday — the crowd cheered frantically between each song and most of us seemed to know every word during the multiple singalongs scattered throughout the set. Of course, the old songs got the biggest applause. During the first encore, Crowded House finally busted out their two biggest hits: Don’t Dream It’s Over and Something So Strong. Don’t Dream It’s Over featured more stripped down acoustic instrumentation than the version on their debut album. After hearing so many new tunes that caught my ear, it was really nice to hear stellar versions of the two CH songs that used to rock my Fisher-Price cassette player back in 4th grade.

The show ended with a fun, improvised medley of The Beatles’ Within You, Without You and Tomorrow Never Knows before they landed on the show-closing Four Seasons In One Day. Everyone in the audience and all of the band members left the venue with a smug look on their faces, signaling that we had all witnessed something truly special.

Those folks that have tickets for the band’s upcoming tour should start getting excited. The beauty of a CH concert is that no two shows are the same. These guys change up the setlist each night and often stray from the list they come up with before the show. Now that I’ve seen them once, I want to see them again and again. Crowded House begins their first US tour since 1996 on August 3rd at Foxwoods (the wonder of it all). They will bring their show to every corner of the earth before the year ends, and it’ll surely be magical.

Crowded House

07/19/2007 Masonic Lodge, NYC NY

Set: People Are Like Suns, Locked Out, Nobody Wants To, Don’t Stop Now, Distant Sun, Heaven That I’m Making, You’re The One To Make Me Cry, Pineapple Head > Hava Negilah > Pineapple Head, Fall At Your Feet, She Called Up, Transit Lounge, Silent House, Pour Le Monde, Improv about the Masonic Lodge, When You Come, Mean To Me

Encore 1: Tea For Two tuning, Something So Strong, Better Be Home Soon, Don’t Dream It’s Over
Encore 2: Fingers of Love, Recurring Dream, Spill the Wine jam > Tomorrow Never Knows, Four Seasons in One Day