Dominant Legs Singer Goes it Alone at CMJ

When Dominant Legs lead singer and guitarist Ryan Lynch took the stage Wednesday night at the Delancey, down on New York City's Lower East Side, it was almost better that he didn't explain why he was performing solo. The CMJ Music Marathon can get pretty formulaic, what with its precise set times and more-is-more approach to showcase scheduling, and it's refreshing when artists defy expectations and try different things in their allotted half-hours.

"My bandmates couldn't make it," an emotionless Lynch told the audience. "I hope you won't be too disappointed. I'm going to play some new ones for you."

Dominant Legs -- a collaboration between Lynch, best known for his guitar work with Girls, and keyboardist Hannah Hunt, a fellow San Francisco-area native -- have only released one EP, so most of their songs were bound to sound new. Without the benefit of Rene Solomon's drums or Hunt's sticky-sweet synths, the music took on a somber, folky air. Lynch stood stoic and strummed a jangly tapioca-color Telecaster, singing with a steely quaver not unlike Neil Diamond's.

He opened with 'Loving Now,' one not found on Dominant Legs' 'Young at Love and Life' EP, and he played with his legs locked stiffly together and eyes closed tight. The song featured a ringing Johnny Marr-style riff, a sound he would revisit minutes later on 'Clawing Out at the Walls,' a tune radically transformed by the lack of accompaniment.

On record, 'Clawing' is a swinging pop number: the Supremes' 'Can't Hurry Love' folded into the kind of mid-'90s Dave Matthews jam everyone in the Delancey once dug but now would deny ever liking. Wednesday night, it was just another stark, dusty dispatch from a lonesome desert.

"Way to stick it out!" one girl shouted toward the end of the set.

"I don't know what that means," Lynch said, replying in the slow, knowing tone of the silver-screen Native American chief the Phillipino-Irish-Swedish-German musician for some reason resembles.

The female fan somehow explained that she meant to compliment the performance, and Lynch momentarily let down his guard. For a second, he may have even smiled.

"Oh," he said. "Thank you."