The Aces at Thalia Hall.
On just the second night of their national tour, The Aces dazzle with their groovy new album, Gold Star Baby.
photo by Camille Cypher
On November 5th at 7:30 PM, bedecked in glitter, cheetah print, and leather jackets, a crowd files into Thalia Hall ready to groove to Gold Star Baby, The Aces' funky new pop-disco album. It’s just the second night of the group’s national tour, but as lead vocalist Cristal Ramirez tells the crowd, “Like a girl all your friends tell you not to date, I see your potential.” And over the next two hours, The Aces themselves embrace the newness of the tour, experimenting with and elevating an album perfectly fit for tour and the dance floor of Thalia Hall.
Now stunning on stages all over North America, the band was initially created by Ramirez when she was just 10 years old, alongside guitarist Katie Henderson, bassist McKenna Petty, and drummer Alisa Ramirez, Cristal’s sister. Back then, the entire group was living in Provo, Utah as a part of the Mormon church, practicing in garages, playing a Maroon 5 cover at a school talent show, and performing at local bars. The Aces have come a long way since: signing with Red Bull Records, releasing four albums, opening for 5 Seconds of Summer, playing festivals, and headlining their own tours. I first discovered the band two years ago through their energetic pop-rock album I’ve Loved You For So Long, a work that mixes early 2000’s Avril headbanging and synth pop with themes of anxiety, maturity, and queer love in the 21st century.
Gold Star Baby, released this past August, is no less energetic and explorative, a succinct but never monotone concept album characterized by funk, disco, and danceability yet still grounded in The Aces’ rock roots. Evidently, The Aces are inspired by bands like Queen and Earth, Wind, and Fire. And on just the second night of their North American tour—even though, as Ramirez explains more than once, the group is “figuring out the kinks”—The Aces are already shining.
Thalia Hall is the perfect intimate venue for this early tour date. There’s just enough room on stage and in the crowd for both the performers and audience members to “put a dip in [their] hips, a cut in [their] strut, and smoke in [their] stroke”—so says the voiceover in the intro track, “Welcome to Gold Star Baby.” The audience obliges, grooving to the modern funk hit “Jealous,” after which Ramirez remarks, “You all look beautiful. I can see all of you.” While the group certainly has a large queer fanbase, one look around the room reveals a far more expansive audience. I find myself panning the standing crowd, then up to the seated balcony where one couple is confidently grinding. “You’re only job is to get fucked up if you’re of age,” Ramirez continues, “Don’t if you’re not.” At this point, I’m looking at a father with his 8-year-old daughter up on his shoulders. Then, Ramirez shouts, “Where are the lesbians in the crowd!” To high-pitched screams, the next song begins.
photo by Camille Cypher
The tour certainly feels new: Ramirez forgets nearly half the words to “You Got Me” and opener Lydia Night’s merch hasn’t arrived in time, so she’s instead selling “custom-made” Hanes white tees with sharpie scrawled over them reading “Lydia Night made me gay” and other more explicit phrases. But still, The Aces emerge in these moments of discovery and the crowd revels in being a part of something new.
Under “The Girls Interlude”—a fictionalized phone call about attending an upcoming Aces concert in glitter and cheetah print, only to remember that both callers’ exes will be there—The Aces roll out a bar cart. When Ramirez notes that it’s time for a Best Dressed Contest and that the winner gets to take a shot with the band on stage, the crowd roars. Ramirez and Petty begin scanning the crowd for the “Gold Star Baby of the Night” and land on a woman in a two-piece sparkly body suit. After she and a few honorable mentions—in equally glittery garb—are pulled up onto stage, Ramirez shouts “Give it up for the Gold Star Babies,” and the group takes their shots.
On the heels of hard liquor and after the winners are escorted off stage comes “Stroke,” a song whose hook—“Stroke, stroke, stroke”—is bouncy, simple, and emblematic of the album’s all-around groove. Ramirez lifts the mic stand over her shoulder and struts up and down the stage while Petty and Hendersen rock out behind their own stands. Even for slower songs like “Stroke,” the crowd is bumping. I notice an usher hit every beat of “A girl who keeps me con-fi-dent” with her shoulders. Later, during the higher tempo “Always Get This Way,” the 6-foot-plus-tall man on the barricade finds the space to headbang respectfully while the two women behind me sidestep and snap in turn. And just before the groovy “She Likes Me,” Ramirez tells the crowd, “We’re in the funky chapter of the show. Chicago, you’re only at 60% funk, but we can get you there.” And in the percussion-heavy song that follows—itself set on a crowded dance floor—the crowd does, in fact, get there.
Later in the night, Henderson stops Ramirez during an interlude to ask if anyone ever listened to “Aces Space,” a podcast in which the group spoke on everything from Disneyland to worst date stories, but which most notably included a segment called “Tea of the Week.” The band then asks if anyone has any gossip. The crowd clearly does, but most seem hesitant to share. Ramirez singles out a woman who “looks like she has something juicy.” A second, then the woman reveals that she dated her boss. The band then asks if the person with her is her boss. “No, my roommate.” The audience groans and jests until Henderson announces that The Aces have their very own gossip: a new song called “Square One,” released on November 14. The stage washes in purple light, the band debuts the new song, and the crowd really buys in for the bridge, entirely comprised of one statement (and one accompanying gesture): “Fuck you and your new girlfriend.” At the song’s finish, the man in front of me—who is sporting one of Lydia Night’s custom-made t-shirts—turns to his friend: “That was a banger.” Before I can ask him how much he paid for the shirt, the opening riff of “Girls Make Me Wanna Die” interrupts, and he’s up and belting along to the rapid-fire lyrics of The Aces' near-perfect rock depiction of modern gay romance.
The reaction from the crowd is much the same. The respectful headbanger is eating up every word, somehow either all over the floor or three feet in the air. Chicago is clearly at 100% funk now, mining synchronized guitar hits alongside Henderson and shouting “Ah-Uhs!” during “The Magic.” From there into the disco-pop confessional “You Got Me” and into their final song, “Stuck,” The Aces are jamming right along with the crowd.
As the show ends, the man in front of me returns with another Lydia Night shirt slung over his shoulder, and Henderson and Petty throw their picks to a reaching crowd. And when Henderson tosses the respectful headbanger the setlist and his friend goes to take a photo of him with the crumpled paper, he’s jumping even then.
Edited by Madison Esrey
Photos by Camille Cypher