Saturday’s Indie Rewind tribute show packed the Granada to celebrate Y2K hits

January 12, 2026

Nick Spacek,

The Fun Guy. // photo by Nick Spacek

My throat is absolutely shredded and I definitely should’ve drank more water, so basically, it was like returning to the early ’00s at last night’s Indie Rewind: A Y2K Tribute Concert at the Granada in Lawrence, which saw a lineup of local bands performing full tribute sets to some of the early 2000s indie rock revival’s most influential artists.

Over the last few years, Fally Afani and I Heart Local Music have put together a themed tribute show featuring local acts tackling a variety of bands and genres. 2019’s Queen tribute coincided with the band’s biopic, Bohemian Rhapsody, getting nominated for a slew of Oscars and last year’s ’90s country bash packed the Bottleneck near to capacity, so it seemed inevitable that the show would return to a larger venue for Saturday night’s show.

An all-ages show on a Saturday which kicked off at 6 and was over by 9 meant that quite a crowd turned out to see a lineup which was just as diverse stylistically as it was in the makeup of the performers. As Afani noted as the show kicked off, half the talent on stage were either queer or immigrants.

Chay D. Boots. // photo by Nick Spacek

The show saw Mickey Mouse Slaughterhouse performing The Ting Tings, Oxytoxin performing The Hives, Hello Biplane performing Yeah Yeah Yeahs, The Fun Guy performing The Strokes, and The Sluts performing The White Stripes, along with drag performers Chay D. Boots and Kansas Campbell working it to cuts by Santigold and Kelis, among others.

The crowd skewed to kids who weren’t even born when many of these songs were first released, as well as those such as myself who recall many of these songs gaining regular KJHK airplay in their heyday. It was a giant sing-along dancefest, with surprises galore as the show went along.

Seeing heavier bands like Mickey Mouse Slaughterhouse rock the utterly danceable Ting Tings or Oxytoxin putting a sludgy take on the Hives’ garage was a way to see these musicians step outside their usual genres, while still utterly kicking ass, with bassist Val pulling double duty in both bands.

Hello Biplane. // photo by Nick Spacek

Hello Biplane usually sees the band’s Spencer Goertz-Giffen tied to a guitar, so watching her stalk the stage doing her best Karen O while Braden Young fucking ripped those guitar solos in “Maps” while we all sang along at the top of our lungs and openly cried.

The Fun Guy doesn’t play out a lot, but when they do, it’s worth catching their take on post-punk indie rock, making them exactly the band to tackle the Strokes “Last Night” and “Reptilia,” among other classic cuts.

Garage rock duo the Sluts were the obvious choice to cover the White Stripes, but aside from “Fell in Love with a Girl,” Kris Dover and Ryan Wise avoided the obvious. While there would be no “Seven Nation Army,” there was all seven minutes of the Elephant cut “Ball and Biscuit,” which left my jaw on the floor. I’ve been seeing Wise play for over a decade now, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen him shred quite as well as he did on that song’s blues riffs.

Chay D. Boots