Bird and the Bee Perform Hall and Oates Tribute

The crowd had to have seen it coming. The first sign appeared the moment the curtain opened. There was the Bird and the Bee in expanded octet form with a veritable arsenal of instruments and voices at its disposal. And yet, just left of center stage stood the night's indisputable question mark: a conspicuously unattended microphone, just begging for a special guest.

  PHOTOS:

Click to enlarge

Click to enlarge

Click to enlarge

Photos by Andrew Herrold

 

new TWTR.Widget({ version: 2, type: 'search', search: 'Bird and the Bee', interval: 6000, title: 'More from Twitter on', subject: 'Bird and the Bee', width: 223, height: 175, theme: { shell: { background: '#cccccc', color: '#000000' }, tweets: { background: '#ffffff', color: '#444444', links: '#1985b5' } }, features: { scrollbar: true, loop: true, live: true, hashtags: true, timestamp: true, avatars: true, behavior: 'default' }}).render().start();

Add to this the occasion for the sold out show at Los Angeles' El Rey Theatre on Friday night – the pending release of the duo's Interpreting the Masters, Vol. 1: A Tribute to Daryl Hall and John Oates – and, well, there was really only one of two ways the night could have gone.

For those paying attention, the answer came about halfway into the Bird and Bee original "Man," as Inara George conducted her four-girl choir and Greg Kurstin lorded over his stack of keys and knobs. A small figure with a curly mess of dark hair appeared in the wings and, a song later – while erstwhile Beck bassist Justin Meldal-Johnsen plucked out the moody pulse for "My Love" – had a guitar lowered onto his shoulders by an eager stagehand.

Those details seemed lost on the audience, and with good reason. Not only was the Bird and the Bee at the top of its game, lithely hopping back and forth between its own jazz-pop tunes and Hall and Oates' most ubiquitous yacht-rock anthems, but George was visibly very pregnant, and in good humor. Between songs she'd catch her breath and field questions from the crowd: "When are you due?" April 30. "Boy or girl?" A surprise. "Who's the daddy?" Very funny.

LISTEN: Bird and the Bee, 'Rich Girl' (SPIN.com Exclusive)