If you came to the show based only on seeing Devotchka perform their song featured in a commercial for the XBox's Gears of War 2, you were not alone.  The emotionally charged "How it Ends" is an amazing song, but Devotchka has much more to offer I found. They are a four piece band with many influences including Slavic, Mariachi, Greek and more.  The first thing I noticed was how such a small stand held their gigantic sousaphone.  It seemed poised to fall at any moment, but of course never did.  The set up for the band was the longest of the three, and so I waited patiently with an array of guitar effect pedals placed in front of me, numbering almost a dozen.  A good show was going to happen, or at least one of a mighty effort I noted from the white folded towels placed near the microphones.  They were never used though.

A recorded chanting introduced the band who walked on stage dressed fairly nice.  Even the violinist, Tom Hagerman who played a few songs for Crooked Fingers had changed or at least added a nice jacket.  The first song "Enemy Guns" had some Latin flavor and was a good start to their set, though sounded familiar.  Once he was playing, lead singer Nick Urata visually reminded me slightly of a young Johnny Cash.  Band member Jeanie Schroder played the acoustic bass on this song.

On the second song the violinist started alone with the light shining only on him as he played. Shroder switched to the sousaphone which was lit up in blue christmas lights and tinsel coming out of it, a very eye catching visual.  The music turned to more of a gypsy style: Very catchy, bouncy and fun.  Nick used the theremin on part of this song and would not return to it until much later on in the show.

On the third song, "Head Honcho", Shroder goes back to the bass and Hagerman switches from violin to accordion.  These instrument changes would be frequent throughout the rest of the show.  This song was still bouncy and Slavic gypsy influenced as before, but had some polka to it as well.  At this point I noticed Nick's zipper was down, though this was probably not apparent to any not standing front and center.  Not knowing what his reaction would be, and the fact that in zipping up he might make it obvious to those not aware, I let it go and hoped I made the right decision.

"The Clockwise Witness" played next was one of the stand outs, not considering "How it Ends", and began with catchy violin string plucking.  Nick added his own unconventional instrument use with guitar body tapping.  The influences in this song were less apparent, though I would not say this was the reason it was more memorable.

The next song was done with a trumpet player who was not present until now, and had the drummer shaking maracas in addition to his drumming.  The guitar combined with the trumpet and maracas returned it to more of a mariachi style.  The crowd was not being driven into a frenzy, but plenty clapped along to the next song when Shroder initiated it.  The following song had a creepy and dangerous sort of tone, the kind you would hear right as or before someone decides to do a horrible crime.  For this song Nick used the bouzouki, an instrument similar to a mandolin that is found in Greek music.  The bouzouki was heavily distorted though and did not put out a sound that you would expect, but really helped the song reach a nice climax.

After this song the drummer came up with a trumpet along side the first trumpet player for some double trumpet power.  The mariachi sound of this was followed by "How it Ends" which was done very well.  My only complaint would be they did not punch the instrumental which is the most crucial part of the song.  Hagerman played keyboard for most of the song until the last time the sweeping chorus was done where he played violin which helped give this portion a little more power.  Complaint aside, it was still very moving.

A couple songs later cheers were heard as a song began, implying they had fans who knew their songs.  Instruments were still switching around, but also one was added: a glockenspiel in all appearance, played by the drummer.  The next song, "I Cried Like a Silly Boy" was another standout, mainly from the high pitch crooning chorus.  After this song, the sousaphone finally came back after being absent for a few songs.  It was another catchy and bouncy song, pushed along by the sousaphone making it very much a toe tapper.  This was preceded by another slightly creepy song, though was still bouncy in a circus/polka sort of way.  The tempo sped up at one point, then went back down, but then at the end went even faster than before.  At some point Nick broke a string on the bouzouki, but you could not audibly tell. During the middle of the song Nick thanked the crowd for their strong applause and introduced the band one by one.  He sang out variations of "Ya ya youi" to the crowd to shout them back which they did and it was a lot of fun.  The crowd has to love you if you want to try that kind of interaction.  This crowd did love them and cheered as Nick raised his wine bottle to them before the band left the stage.

Devotchka came back shortly for the encore which were two songs including more violin plucking, the drummer on accordion, A return of the theremin and a finale of a suddenly increased tempo.  This is a band that knows how to finish a show. Nick had been so into striking the tambourine against his wine bottle that part of the tambourine broke off.  They not only played a great show, but a long one.  Sixteen songs is not unheard of, but it tops the average.  Through those sixteen songs there was enough variation that I did not get bored, but the high quality of the music never waned either.  The only major issue to be had is the liberal use of obvious straight rhyming.  This is forgivable though, because there is so more to enjoy than complain about in this solid band.