Crystal Castles
Neumo's; Seattle, WA
If there's still a distinction between electronic dance music and rock ‘n’ roll, it’s fading fast. As synths mingle with, or replace, guitars and the traditional four-piece gets pared down to the two-piece or one-piece, an unfortunate side-effect has emerged: an epidemic of poor showmanship. Luckily, Crystal Castles seemed determined to buck this trend.
Opening act David Wolf, however, epitomized these boring performances. The Tacoma, WA-based solo act slowly rocked back and forth behind his computer, staring at the monitor. Every couple of minutes he took a sip of water, then gently placed the bottle back down on the table next to his computer. Afterward, Tempe, Arizona’s Lymbyc System crafted a mesmerizing mix of drums and echo-laden clavinet that was by turns tranquil and hugely magnificent. The clavinet’s keyboard/electric guitar hybrid tone sounded incredible as Jared Bell allowed the volume to ebb and swell alongside his brother Mike Bell’s superb drumming.
Crystal Castles soon took the stage with a burst of verve that didn’t let up for an instant of their 45-minute set. The moment their waves of 8-bit melody flowed through the speakers, the audience convulsed in a mass of movement closer to a riot than a rave. There were no guitarists in sight, no punk rock beats, yet the area in front of the stage transformed into a mass of hip teenagers jumping and pushing each other. Unrelenting strobe lights provided the only illumination of the stage and transformed Alice Glass into a blur of motion with jet-black hair, a black t-shirt, and raccoon-like eye shadow.
Ethan Kath didn’t add much to the performance; he stood stationary behind his electronics in his signature black hoodie. He kept the instrumental tracks faithful to the recordings and didn’t interact with the crowd. No problem though, Glass was the star of the show, as she writhed and shrieked demonically in front of a large banner of their infamous mangled Madonna image, her frenetic antics feeding the enthusiasm of the crowd-surfing audience in front of her. The stage didn’t seem to have enough space to contain her, as she kept hurling herself into the arms of the crowd. At one point, she wrapped the microphone around her neck and stared forlornly at the audience. (I think it was supposed to be edgy.)
Still, the performance was a refreshing injection of energy and engagement. While I would have preferred a crowd of dancers rather than the quasi-mosh pit, maybe I’m just getting old. In any case, it was a captivating, frenzied spectacle -- can't argue with that.
Baltimore Round Robin: Eyes Night
(Le) Poisson Rouge; New York, NY
Baltimore has invaded NYC. Its musicians are hovering on the sidewalk of Bleecker Street, looking haggard after two weeks on the road. What do they need? Food? Sleep? Vitamins? Vegetable oil as alternative fuel? All of the above, it seems, to assure that they can make it back to Charm City. But they can’t hit the road just quite yet. They’ve got to deliver not one, two, or three more shows, but a whopping four shows over the course of two nights. Daunting, maybe, but they are in it together -- all 60 of them.
In the depths of (Le) Poisson Rouge, projectors are already casting rainbow patterns onto eager faces and the surrounding arsenal of instruments. This is the Round Robin's Eyes Night showcase (Feet Night follows the next day), and, appropriately, the setup looks more like a collective warehouse space than a Greenwich Village nightclub.
After the Baltimoreans join hands to surround the crowd and lead a collective hum, they take turns hopping on the many makeshift stages to showcase their sounds: Teeth Mountain brings droning strings and tribal beats; Lexie Mountain Boys sway and chant out their one-of-a-kind, elaborately costumed performance pieces; Nautical Almanac, visible only as silhouettes behind a backlit sheet, emits a variety of esoteric noise; Jana Hunter and Lesser Gonzalez Alvarez carry the pensive, but not cliché, singer-songwriter banner; and, finally, Beach House places an emphatic period on each Round Robin rotation with their dramatic and encompassing sound.
While the more recognizable names meet expectations, it’s the lesser-exposed “side show” acts that make the night unique and engaging. The Creepers and Santa Dads' quirky tunes and mannerisms inspire smiles in the crowd, while Blue Leader, decked out in a Cyclops superhero costume, gives video-accompanied philosophical monologues on first-person shooters and other games. After “preparing” the audience with a mantra of “Homer Simpson, Bart Simpson, Lisa Simpson, Marge Simpson, Maggie, Maggie, Maggie, Maggie,” the comical Showbeast presents a video that comes across like a tripped-out Jim Henson skit.
As the Round Robin's night one ends, ringleader Dan Deacon teeters on stage, slightly sloshed, to introduce the participants of Eyes Night and to remind the crowd to come back the following day, when he and more of his traveling troupe will present the more fuel-injected Feet Night. As the lights come on, security rushes people up the venue’s stairs, making way for the night’s next show and bringing this Exploding Plastic Inevitable-esque road show one step closer to home.
Deerhoof / Fertile Crescent / Experimental Dental School
40 Watt Club; Athens, GA
Walking into the 40 Watt on Halloween amid throngs of blood-plastered faces and ingeniously-engineered DIY costumes, I immediately recognized that, whether I liked it or not, I would be judging Deerhoof’s performance largely on their collective Halloween spirit and attention to costume. So when the band strolled out in mammoth, teetering carnivorous cat masks, excepting drummer Greg Saunier as the lone rodent in a mouse costume that was quickly drenched in sweat, the night’s success was effectively ensured.
Though to be fair, I should admit that I am the hugest of Deerhoof nerds, and given that this was to be my very first ‘Hoof show, I was sufficiently geeked-out. The band could do no wrong in my adoring eyes. This unadulterated enthusiasm extended even to their energetic opener “Basketball Get Your Groove Back” -- a song that I consider the weakest on the otherwise untouchable Offend Maggie. A large part of the band’s success this night in translating their recordings into powerful performances can be attributed to their new guitarist, Ed Rodriguez, whose zeal was shown with his enormous, continual grin, peeking out from under his ridiculously-oversized plush white tiger mask.
Only a few songs into the set, the excitement broke into fever pitch -- “Holy Night Fever” pitch I should say, heh heh, an obvious crowd favorite -- when Satomi broke out the silly string. Pretty wild Halloween show, right? By all accounts, Deerhoof is a pretty weird band, and given the artsy, almost abstruse experimental nature of their albums, it’s easy to forget how downright funky and straight-ahead rockin’ ol Deerhoof can be. Once again, the added guitar-power of Ed Rodriguez, not to mention the sheer insanity of Greg Saunier’s drum skills, brought out the rock, as the band stuck to songs that seemed best suited to live performance, like “Twin Killers,” “Wrong Time Capsule,” and “Spirit Ditties of No Tone” off The Runners Four.
“Milk Man” closed the show, and by this time, a sizable contingent of drunken, costumed assholes were trying their best to ruin the almost perfect show by creating an egregiously rowdy mosh pit directly to my left. Is it just me or is a Deerhoof show not the kind of place you expect to get elbowed in the face? However, John Dieterich, with a lion’s head slung behind his own like a fuzzy turtle shell hat, revived the night’s overwhelming sense of pure Deerhoof delight, when he stopped to take pictures of everyone’s costumes. Earlier, Greg had stopped the show to mention how excited he was by everyone’s costumes, and John’s aftershow photos only reinforced the feeling that Deerhoof's awesome performance is directly related to how much they care about what they do.
Against Me! / Ted Leo + The Pharmacists / Future of the Left
Webster Hall; New York, NY
In the last 5 years, we’ve seen Death Cab for Cutie become a household name; we’ve seen “emo” become a term that people, who weren’t alive when “Friday I’m In Love” came out, apparently know enough about to debate its meaning on their blogs; and bands like The Arcade Fire have seen enough money to seriously call into question the relevance of independent rock ‘n’ roll in 2008.
But thankfully, providence has blessed our wearied ears with a tour lineup of Future of the Left, Ted Leo and the Pharmacists, and Against Me! True, five years have changed these bands as much as anyone else. Mclusky may have broken up and partially reformed as Future of the Left; Ted Leo may have embraced ska and lost his longtime bassist Dave Lerner; and Against Me! may have become a band that you can actually hear on mainstream radio, but for a second at least, this lineup offers a chance to think back on a simpler time: a time when the indie world was riding high on such masterpieces as Mclusky’s Do Dallas (2002), Ted Leo’s The Tyranny of Distance (2001), and Against Me!’s Reinventing Axl Rose (2002).
Future of the Left, with a familiar three-piece lineup and the same lyrical preoccupations and rhythmic immediacy, sounds enough like vintage Mclusky to hold up their side of the bargain in this nostaligic delusion. Following through on the promise of 2007’s Curses, they kicked the ass of an unsuspecting crowd for a full 30 minutes. Songs from Curses (“adeadenemyalwayssmellsgood,” “Small Bones, Small Bodies,” “Manchasm,” and others) took on a new life in the live setting, as the surprisingly intricate vocal interplay between bassist Kelson Mathias and guitarist Andy “Falco” Falkous benefited from the lack of studio glossiness, coming through much more clearly and effectively. The set also included three new songs, including “A Hope That House Built,” and an extended multipart freakout that closed the set with a very un-Mclusky level of psychedelic instrumental abandon.
Perhaps even more entertaining, though, was their witty and crass onstage banter. Falkous’s lyrics, which promote violence and love as two sides of the same coin, may have been too often buried by less-than-stellar mixing, but even if you couldn’t make out his entreaty, from “Small Bones, Small Bodies,” to, “grow into your body happily,” Mathias’ attempt to affably lead the crowd in a cheer dedicated to Leo and Against Me! should have gotten across the band’s perhaps too-often buried sympathetic side. The violence half of the coin, was, of course, covered by Mathias threatening to karate kick a less adoring member of the crowd through the wall into “the venue next door”.
Ted Leo, for his part, opened with faithfully stirring renditions of Tyranny of Distance’s “Timorous Me” and followed it with “Where Have All the Rude Boy’s Gone” from 2003’s Hearts of Oak, giving the momentary impression that maybe nothing had changed at all in the last five years. Of course, he then shattered the illusion by launching into more recent material from Shake the Sheets and Living With the Living. While the newer material, which made up the entirety of the rest of the set, may have lacked the effortless joy of the first two songs, at no point did the show lose a sense of purpose, and Leo, despite his apparent laryngitis, maintained the same level of positive intensity that has become something of a trademark for him. If anything, the fact that Leo was losing his voice and the manner in which he unceremoniously dispatched each tune -- businesslike, but not in a bad way -- supported his claim to the title of hardest working man in independent rock ‘n’ roll.
But Against Me! are the real success story on this bill, having come a long way since Axl Rose. They’ve built a rabid teenage fanbase, who showed up in droves for this show. If you weren’t an under-21 Against Me! freak, you were in the minority here, and that made for a great concert-going experience in a few notable ways. For one, apparently the rule that says you can’t wear a band’s t-shirt to a concert where they’re performing doesn’t apply to Against Me!’s fans. Not only was the crowd lousy with 18-year-old kids wearing all manner of Against Me! apparel -- much of it identical to the items available at the merch table and seemingly very new -- but this seemed like a perfectly natural and reasonable expression of appreciation for the band. Depressing as it is to watch fans of a band far past their prime stroll around outdoor amphitheaters, holding aluminum light beer bottles and wearing the shirt they bought at last year’s tour, emblazoned with the hideous artwork from last years cash-in comeback album, it almost warms the heart to see a young crowd this large show enough devotion to a band this not-shitty to not only stencil the band’s name onto the back of a denim jacket, but to wear such a jacket to the band’s concert and, what’s more, show up three hours before the band even goes on. This sort of positive energy created by younger, more dedicated, and less grizzled fans is only one of the many reasons that all-ages shows -- this one was 16+, but felt all-ages enough -- should be the rule rather than exception in live music.
Unfortunately, the show itself couldn’t live up to the level of excitement stoked by the fan’s expectations. The band performed around a dozen songs, heavily leaning on material from last year’s New Wave, sounding very similar to the versions you’d find on an Against Me! record. The mix was good, the performances were tight, but everything about the music worked towards the impression that what was going on wasn’t much different than listening to the album. Visually, while a large projection of the awesome tiger face from the New Wave artwork was a nice touch, the band did little to differentiate the experience from that of watching one of their music videos on YouTube.
Before this gets too negative, though, let’s get it straight that the point of an Against Me! show, as borne out by the both their performance and the reaction of their fans, isn’t to present a new experience, to expand upon musical ideas laid down in the band’s recordings, or to recontextualize the band’s music. Against Me!’s fans want to hear the songs they know and love, played by the band that they know and love, the way that they know and love. And while these songs are being played, they want to be able to sing along with their friends, dance and brush up against each other, jump up on the stage and crowd surf, or if they’re not brave enough, get their crowd surf kicks vicariously from their fellow fans.
Against Me! delivered this experience in spades. Their songs are perfectly vague (a more brilliantly soothing and meaningless lyric than “Stop/Take some time to think/ Figure out what’s important to you” may never have been written); their music overlooks the conventions of pop punk just enough to feel slightly threatening without actually being threatening, and even the way they look on stage is the precisely prescribed form of anonymous. Tattooed, short hair, black shirts (or no shirts), they visually embody hardcore’s “I’m no more important than you” ethos, albeit while playing songs that, like all good-not-great pop music are unlikely to call anyone’s personal beliefs into question and are fun to sing along with.
Teenage music is often described as angry and rebellious, but, the music that really speaks to the teenage experience is more often closer to Against Me!’s brand of almost pop, almost punk: confrontational at first glance, but essentially amorphous and thus adaptable to the confused and ever-changing concerns of adolescent and post-adolescent life. Against Me!’s teenage fanbase identifies with the band, not necessarily because of who the band is or what they say, but because their image and message is malleable enough that anyone can build an earnest personal connection to it. Whatever the reason, though, the crowd’s devotion was never in question: this show included perhaps the most sincere stage diving I have ever witnessed.
As strong as the urge to relive 2002 might be, the real thrill of this show came from rekindling an adolescent excitement not from remembering that first Ted Leo show you saw where he tore up “The Great Communicator” at the end, but from watching the Against Me! kids go crazy to music that is definitively theirs. In 2002, this still would have been a 16+ show and these kids wouldn’t have gotten in, so why not embrace 2008?
Halloween House Show: Mauarder and Alibi, Pipe(s) of the Doctor of Witchcraft / White Manna / Starving Weirdos
Halloween House Show; Arcata, CA
By 10:45 PM, I was late, mostly because my "sensible" heels had proven to be otherwise and walking across town had left my feet blistered and swollen. Barefoot, I entered the house and was quickly swept up by a crowd populated by gynecologists, Roman gladiators, and Judas Priest fans, all here to celebrate Halloween the way citizens of Humboldt county invariably celebrate every weekend: a house show. The first two bands had already gone on -- Maurader and Alibi, an experimental soundtracking duo creating what they call "re-partitioned apocalypso instrumentation," and local group Pipe(s) of the Doctor of Witchcraft, who were also of the avant variety.
By 11 o'clock, the time for White Manna had come. The five local boys making up WM delivered what the flier had promised: an evening of house party, stoner psych rock loud enough to make your heart skip beats, and went so far as to accompany it with a midi-organ. Silhouetted against a cardboard haunted-house backdrop, paper bats swung from the ceiling and blocked the light of the projector playing segmented 8mm films on the wall. To my left, a group of five or six individuals swayed around in a cooperative slow-motion mosh pit, as the heavily distorted Telecaster made my ears throb and eyes water, blurring reality into a mess of indistinguishable waves. Nearly 30 minute passed without a pause or breath, just a constant barrage of bass and crashing cymbals or a blazing guitar solo ebbing in and out of a pacing drum beat like one long crescendo. After a while, my wandering mind drew a connection to the dissonant garage rock of the Godz, and as chance would have it, a comp entitled Eureka Freak #3 Sampler: A Tribute to the Godz, was available after the set.
A little after midnight, the dispersed crowd congealed once again into an anxious mass for the Starving Weirdos, a group of great local and even fair international renown. With many individuals sprawled supine on the carpet, the foursome ensemble began their heavy "floorcore" set, each member crouched low over a seemingly incomprehensible tangle of cords, knobs, and pedals. The first minute of sound was deafening. A man dressed as a Syrian well-digger (I had to ask to find out; he looked like a Guantanamo escapee) twiddled a knob that made a low-whine squeal launch into the ultrasonic range, as another man in a shepherd's cloak convulsed over a single button emitting a small blue light, controlling who knows which sound amongst the orchestrated cacophony.
After an epic soundscape of another 30 minutes utilizing bells, chimes, violins, shakers, and bugle horns, the discordant wails succumbed to an over-reaching beat as they crowd gave in to a synchronized head-bob, the chaos momentarily unified before it shuddered to halt. Silence hung heavy for a instant before drunken onlookers burst into congratulatory hollers and applause, lively conversation reining again. As I made my way to the door, a mime talking to a large man dressed as Elmo said precisely what was on my mind, "That was amazing. They're so in my Top 10 friends." (Which they now are.)
The time was soon 1:15 AM and Sunburned Hand of the Man, the East Coast experimental psych outfit, was yet to make their headlining appearance. The kegs were all empty (all of them), and frankly I'd boogalooed as long as I could stand. By 1:30, the audience was cleaved, the hardcore separated from the casual observers, and it was apparent that I was not of the former. I was exhausted. Dejected and ready for bed, I made my way towards the door, shoes in hand, for the long walk home. In hindsight that was lame; I probably should have stayed. Rumor has it it was a "mind-blowing set, man. Can't believe you left." Story of my life.
Dead C / Northampton Wools / Sightings / King Darves
Bowery Ballroom; New York, NY
It’s with some serendipity that New Zealand noise-rockers the Dead C would be making an appearance in New York at the same time the actual Dead Sea scrolls would be on display at the Jewish Museum in the very same city. Indeed, for both, a Manhattan appearance is equally rare. Though there exists no tour t-shirt to document the scrolls globe trekking, the band, the Dead C are on record as having only made one journey to the states before this tour, to play the Los Angeles chapter of All Tomorrow’s Parties back in 2002. Like the scrolls, the Dunedin, New Zealand band’s extensive back catalog has been ruminated over, each new release pored over for meaning and intent, and as is the case for both, new paradoxes arise out of every examination of their output.
New York City parking regulations had me circling the Bowery Ballroom 20 or 30 times before settling upon a viable spot to stash my ride. Unfortunately, I had already missed openers King Darves. Bummer. So it would be Northampton Wools that would whet my live music whistle for the night. The guitar mangling duo of Thurston Moore and Bill Nace invoked the spirit of Derek Bailey, as the two started out with spacious, delicate amblings only to build towards further rupture and the all-out guitar squall Thurston has manifested in over a bazillion projects. In a particularly pleasing moment (after several awkward silences), Thurston, in a fit of fury, slammed a file against the strings and continued to absolutely maul the guitar that sat torturously, crying out for help upon his lap.
Sightings continued the guitar abuse with their skronk ‘n’ pummel routine. Rich Hoffman provided plenty of dyspeptic “bass face,” switching from slinky-snake charming riffs to retard rumble, while Mark Morgan danced around the stage doing a hybrid Russian folk dance mixed with a modified version of the limbo. The synth pad/actual drum drumming of Jon Lockie further accentuated Sightings half-man/half-machine hybrid attack. The whole Sightings package kind of sounds like what Einstürzende Neubauten would if they were around in the late-’60s -- call it industrial-edelia if that suits you (it shouldn’t). Not recognizing this song cycle from their latest Through the Panama, it stands to reason these new jams are to be featured on some sort of new album, which has me atwitter with schoolgirl-like excitement.
Dead C took the stage last and culminated a night of discordance. Mike Morley’s lethargic drawl wove a dream-time musical language with Bruce Russell’s guitar noisiness. Russell, in a perpetual Quasimoto slump, leaned over his guitar, not necessarily playing it, but maybe exploiting it, inserting a small metal strip between the fretboard and strings and producing a steady stream of feedback from the small amp he had in front of him. The drumming of Robbie Yeats was impressive; holding together amorphous rock tendencies can’t be easy, but he pulled it off. Their set was full of peaks and valleys, build-ups and let-downs, while an underscore of atonality held it all together. The performance for the most part lacked the energy of some past recorded shows (gotta love that video of them on New Zealand television) and opted for more unilateral unfoldings and subtle crescendos. Although the sheets of sound built up by the C reached some transcendent heights, I felt, overall, they kept it mired in a sort of cosmic funeral dirge. Dead C have to be commended for their unique vision, their disregard of convention, and the sheer influence they have bequeathed, which makes it tough to decry such a seminal and legendary band for being “boring.” To save face, I’ll revert back to that old axiom about Wagner’s music and say that, like the German composer, Dead C are better than they sound.
