Yelle took some time away from her home country of France to hit up Milwaukee's Turner Hall Ballroom last night. On the other hand, her audience, it appeared, made the trip from their parents' house.

The average age of the kids on the floor could have been no higher than 16, and that floor was flooded in a sea of gossipy young girls, trying out swear words, dreaming about band mates, and attempting to smoke in a ballroom that's renown for surviving two fires. Most of them echoed the loud fashion sense of the main act: bright colors, stripes and tights, tights, tights.

Yelle's energy bursts from an almond-eyed petite girl with a cute bob. She was dressed in a Mondrian-inspired baggy sundress, which was, surprisingly, mostly black and white and only a few chunks of color (some of which glowed in the dark) and her requisite pair of tights, sparkly.

While her rise to prominence was on the wings of a jab towards another French group (her hit, "Je Veux te Voir"), her music ultimately reflects the happier origin of her name; Yelle is the feminized (in terms of French grammar, not the woman's rights movement) acronym for You Enjoy Life (YEL). She comes from a small town in Brittany called Saint-Julien.

Yelle's set started off fast and bouncy and maintained that clip through several songs. Her music is nothing groundbreaking, which falls very cleanly into the dancey '80s throwback that's been populating the latest iPod and Target ads. She's not as intense as her genre-mates Justice or as edgy as MIA (a comparison I find misguided since the similarities devolve after "A front woman backed by synth.")

Yelle is best digested live and it's fun to get lost in it. The centerpiece of the set was definitely her hit, "Je Veux te Voir," and it was easy to see that coming a mile away. The dance floor threw their hands up, started jumping and the floor became a trampoline. It was easy to picture chunks of plaster falling from the ceiling directly below us.

After "Je Veux te Voir" the band turned down the heat with a few less intense tracks, which was a bit disappointing. The audience was finally at an excellent boil and they were already taking us off the heat. The band found fame with its most catchy pop singles and you would be hard pressed to find anyone who listed any of those as their favorite songs. They're just the most boring and unnecessary parts of the set. If people want to sit one out, they can do that at any time, but for the rest of us, keep the movement coming. I don't want to stop and be reminded that my legs and arms are flailing in strange ways. I just want it to take me away.

After a few tracks, with the chill songs out of the way, Yelle once again picked up speed and got the place moving again until the grand finale, an encore rendition of "Je Veux te Voir," a dicey move that was a little confusing and ultimately couldn't live up to the energy of its first performance. Despite the slight sag in the middle, the night was an overall success. I left sweaty, thirsty and out of breath.

California's Funeral Party opened the night with some post-punk garage rock that only really hit its stride toward the last song. That was the point when the band seemed to finally relax and use some stage antics to get the energy flowing.

It's a shame it took so long, since the band's album seems to flow with much more energy. It was pretty apparent that most of the audience was unfamiliar with the band, but by the end it seemed they had won a few new followers.