Shaun Fleming has certainly had a unique route through the entertainment industry. Beginning as a voice actor, his elastic voice has appeared in several Disney TV properties and notable video games.
Fleming’s been a presence in the lives of the millennial generation for a long time, and it’s been interesting to watch his repertoire blossom into music. Though Fleming hails from California, upon his return to the Boston area in Cambridge’s Middle East nightclub, he reminisced about time he spent years ago living in the area before the genesis of his solo project, Diane Coffee.
One of the most entertaining aspects of indie rock is just how unique and weird it will get, with genre barriers disintegrating further all the time. Diane Coffee embraces that sense of possibility in full. Prior to launching Diane Coffee, Fleming’s most well-known foray into music was as the drummer for his childhood friends’ band, Foxygen, who rose quickly to stardom in the early 2010s.
The visual pageantry of a Diane Coffee live show owes to Fleming’s time in that band, as well as the costumed panache of bands like of Montreal. Taking the stage, the five members are dressed all in reflective foil garb with white polygonal masks – all except for Fleming, that is, who has sublimed into his alter-ego and is wearing a full-body green suit with a transparent loincloth of plastic.
It’s a wild set of looks, and fitting for the theme of the band’s latest record, the synth-pop infused Internet Arms, which features cover art of Coffee, bearing Fleming’s trademark neon yellow hair, behind one such mask.
While the first two Diane Coffee records were somewhat similar to Foxygen, blending an infectious mix of 60s psychedelia with a vocal talent able to evoke Jagger, Bowie, and other greats. Internet Arms sees Fleming and company dive head-first into uncharted musical territory, creating an album that exists in its own conceptual world populated by bright synths, funk influence, and the looming spectre of humanity’s often troubled relationship with technology.
Fleming performs with an eagerness and a genuine sense of joy to be onstage, back in his old stomping grounds. When he’s onstage in his Diane Coffee persona, he takes on a fittingly jittery and manic personality to suit the name, speaking a mile a minute as he addresses the audience to thank them for coming out and experiencing something special together.
Fleming – or Diane, or both – is animated, a natural actor, frequently jumping around the stage and perching on the edge of his bandmates’ amps, striking a statuesque pose. He feeds off the energy of the audience and the band, an unlimited fount of extravagance, and one gets the sense that he’d be happy performing to any audience, anywhere, regardless of circumstance or size.
Inviting opening act Active Bird Community onto the stage, the bands perform Internet Arms standout ‘Work It’ together, a full-on funk jam that seems to offer a positive spin on the possibility of the digital age as an outlet for unfettered expression and change.
Other highlights of the album that joined the set included ‘Simulation’, whose relaxed verses and ensemble vocals transform rapidly into pure uptempo synth-pop; and ‘Lights Off’, which rides on a series of dramatic synth punches. And longtime fans were treated to a pair of tracks from My Friend Fish as well to close the night, including the guitar-led ‘Hymn’, which evokes times gone by with its choir vocals and a thrilling second half full of distorted vocals and tambourines jangling.
It’s a thrilling trip back into the past – a bit Dylan, a bit Rolling Stones – but the truly exciting aspect of Diane Coffee’s music is that you never really know where it will go next, as Shaun Fleming seems to be determined to grow it ever weirder and wilder.
Review and photos by Collin Heroux
