On Friday, February 22nd, several friends and I traveled to Austin to see the enigmatic and unexplainable John Maus at The Mohawk, a bar and multimedia venue on Red River street.  Although I was previously familiar with Maus’s work, I wasn’t a huge fan and really only tagged along as a way to spend time with friends on the weekend of my birthday. What followed was one of the best concert experiences of my life and my transformation into a devoted John Maus convert.

Before John Maus came Sailor Poon, the openers and amazing performers in their own right. An all-girl, Austin- based outfit, Sailor Poon took the stage to perform an awesome set of feminist anthems and hilariously crude songs with a stage presence somewhere between a burlesque show and an X-Ray Spex concert. While I didn’t walk away from their set a huge fan, Sailor Poon gave an awesome show and were, as the Austin-Chronicle called them, “Always Crude, Never Prude”.

After a brief break spent pushing our way to the front of an over sold-out crowd, John Maus finally came out. Compared to the in-your-face Sailor Poon, Maus seemed shy and unassuming. Dressed in loose-fitting jeans, tennis shoes and a blue button up, he could have simply been a stagehand or even a concertgoer who had accidentally wandered on stage. Maus had no backing band or stage crew, only an iPad and his laptop plugged into the speakers. Having set up his equipment, Maus slowly rose from his trademark kneeling position and surveyed the crowd before him, giving no introductions or words of welcome. Then, like a gun went off, Maus opened with “My Whole World’s Coming Apart” and the show proper began.

Having sampled Maus’s gothic, 80s synth-pop inspired catalog, I had an idea of what the show would be like. I figured that everyone would stand and sing, maybe push towards the barricade, or sing while recording video on their phones. What I was not prepared for was moshing that would make a hardcore concert nod in approval. From the second the music began until the encore I was pushed, tossed and jostled all across the pit like never before. My close knit of friends was repeatedly scattered across the venue, only to be pushed back together again. I fought to stay at the front to get a good view of Maus, and managed to stay in front of the stage all night. I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to sing along to the songs with the crowd, but Maus’s cleverly simple lyrics made even the most clueless able to join in on the fun, and I had a blast jumping, swaying, and even crowd surfing to hits like “Rights For Gays” and “Bennington”.

Just as enthralling was Maus himself and his command of the stage. John Maus is a towering, imposing figure whose awesome power is evident not just in his deep, distorted voice but in his constant head banging, jumping, and stage antics (at one point, Maus began running laps around the stage while singing). For someone with no band or instruments, Maus had total control of the venue, making his presence known and keeping the audience in a trance. The relationship between the crowd and Maus was a symbiotic one, with the crowd feeding off of his energy just as much as he fed off of ours. Several times, Maus looked exhausted and ready to finish, before the crowd cheered him on and he gave a throaty scream of triumph, returning to the show before finishing out with “Pets” and an encore of “Believer”.

Like nothing had happened, Maus gave no goodbyes or goodnights. He simply picked up his equipment and power walked off stage, having communicated everything he wanted through his music. I left Mohawk a believer in John Maus.