Welcome to our weekly show recommendation column RSVP HERE – your source for the best NYC shows and interviews with some of our favorite local live bands.
Lola Pistola does not plan on stopping anytime soon. With a raw energetic live show that’s not to be missed, Lola Pistola debuted their grunge and noise pop soaked album Curfew last year on Burger Records, toured the US with drummer Robert Preston (who also fronts Pink Mexico), and are closing out the year with a show at Our Wicked Lady on December 13 with Toward Space, Metalleg, and Johnny Dolphins.
Currently Brooklyn-based, Lola (aka Arvelisse Ruby) grew up in the Puerto Rican punk scene and is also a florist, photographer and contributor to AltCitizen. We chatted with Lola about her love for grunge and NYC’s ’70s punk scene, the changing landscape of New York’s current scene and what her live set would smell like.
AF: What is your favorite part about where you come from and where you are now, both geographically and musically? Where do you want to go?
LP: My favorite part about being from Puerto Rico is how important arts is for creatives and Puerto Ricans in general. No matter the occasion, there’s always music and a sense of community and bonding, whether it’s with family or friends. We have an unusual approach to what we do. I believe Puerto Ricans excel in arts, in music, in theater because we are just moved genuinely by what it means to be oneself and are passionate about our legacy. I loved loved loved being an spectator of the underground punk scene there. It’s chaotic, and loud, and there are many talented and unique bands that are still active after more than 15 years. I think that definitely made me fall in love with music, and learn about the punk scene around the world, specially in Spain and in New York. I’d daydream about playing at CBGB’s, about smoking cigarettes with Debbie Harry, reading poems with Patti Smith, maybe even finding Courtney Love and partying with her too. I feel like now, there’s a lot of that scene that’s undeniably dead. It’s no ones fault. Truly the world is just changing and affecting how we connect with new experiences – how we even promote shows for example. But still, the great thing about New York is the accessibility to local and touring bands, either underground or mainstream, and how there’s a new sound and act popping left and right. For me, I feel like I just want to continue making music, regardless of where I am, and to truthfully to be able to successfully connect with people. I want to continue moving forward where I can be heard, without worrying about scenes, without worrying about how many likes I get on social media. I want to go around the world and back until I fall down or nobody likes my songs anymore. That’s were I want to go.
AF: What shows/bands/artists have had the biggest influence and inspiration on your live set? If your live set was a color what color would it be? What smell would it be?
LP: Let’s just say I spent a lot of time watching Nirvana videos on YouTube using a shitty internet connection. Physically I take on more from movies and dance performances. If my set was a color it would be not a color, but the cathartic after-effect of strobe lights, hinted with the scent of salt water.
AF: If you could share the stage with anyone alive or dead who would it be and why?
LP: I’d love to perform with Iggy Pop, and I don’t think I need to explain why. Present Iggy Pop – full of wise and uncontrollable coolness, and more in control than ever of his voice and vision. His last two albums are definitely part of my favorites of the decade.
AF: When you’re performing do you ever look at a specific stranger and wonder how their day was?
LP: That’s interesting, but not really. I think the whole act, while performing is such an egocentric approach that I am only worried if they can really see me. If I lock eyes with anyone, I just want to make sure they see me.
AF: If you were a street performer and had to do something other than music, what would you do?
LP: A cartoonist.
AF: What are your plans for the next year/decade?
LP: I’m just waiting to be discovered and get a six figure contract, so I can record a couple of bangers and not work anymore. But also, joke aside, I just plan on doing what I do now, just 10 times bigger. I don’t have time to stop now.
We have become so used to the unheard female voice in the music industry. There is an irrefutable gender gap between the number of male musicians who succeed and the number of female ones…I don’t need to tell you about who’s in the lead. But if you think that making it as a non-male musician is hard, imagine the world of curation, booking, and promotion. It’s a tough industry to traverse, but tastemaker Rachael Pazdan of Hypnocraft Presents, LPR Presents, and The Hum, is quite frankly kicking its ass.
Pazdan wears many hats, utilizing her background in dance and the non-profit arts sector to inform her positions as music director for Le Poisson Rouge and talent buyer for Manhattan Inn. Twice a year, Pazdan lets her love of music and interdisciplinary collaboration run wild with The Hum, a month-long weekly series that features super-group-like pairings of all female musicians jamming at Manhattan Inn.
We were lucky enough to sit down with Rachael to discuss the rift between dance and indie rock audiences, the importance of collaboration, and the problem with saying “female musician.”
Audiofemme: The Hum is approaching! What are some collaborations you’re most excited about?
No, using women’s voices. It’s a choir of women singing different notes and they have ear buds in and they’re triggered to know what note to sing next. I think that they’re really gonna love working together and find a lot of commonalities.
Kendra Morris with Allison Miller and Domenica Fossati. Domenica is in Underground System which is an awesome Afrobeat band, she sings and plays flute, Kendra Morris is this pop-soul singer, and Allison Miller has a project called Boom Tic Boom and she’s a jazz drummer…that will be really funky and fun.
I don’t half-ass this. I go after artists that I am personally really excited about. I freak out about this project…bringing all of these different women together that I’ve always wanted to book.
What were some exciting moments you’ve witnessed in the past? Musical or other?
I feel like [The Hum] builds a real sense of community between women, and there are lots of women who have done it and said to me, “I’ve never played with other women before,” which is kind of crazy.
That gives me chills. That’s ridiculous.
Becca Kauffman from Ava Luna told me that now whenever she’s working on new projects she’s going to think of women first. Jen Goma [A Sunny Day in Glasgow] and Teenie from TEEN – that was the first time they’d ever played together and they’re best friends now, they’re constantly collaborating. I think one of the most exciting things for me is this effect that happens after the series and the network of everyone who’s involved growing.
You’re like a matchmaker!
Kind of like dream band matchmaking…
You are often nurturing cross-disciplinary collaborations with other projects as well what do find that collaboration brings out in artists?
Sometimes it really doesn’t work. My original vision for The Hum was to do more poly-genre collaborations and it’s really challenging…artists can be less excited about that. Sometimes I’ll do it-I’m putting Kendra together with Domenica. But even though that is crossing genres, there is so much that makes sense between those two worlds, and it works. It’s really hard for artists because it’s really limited preparation. I haven’t been able to support artists where I’m paying for their rehearsal time, and I feel like if I want to think of some really tricky collaborations I want to be able to commission them.
Looking at some of your previous work like 3:1 and Liquid and Still – you seem to get excited by the idea of creating art out of traditionally uncomfortable situations, and breaking the fourth wall…
Totally. It’s something I naturally do. That’s such a great observation because as a curator I’m really interested in collaboration and challenging artists’ comfort zone. I’m always looking to give artists special opportunities that are outside the normal presenting zone. Now my job is to just be booking straight shows all the time. But any opportunity I get I’m putting together some kind of weird show. For Liquid and Still, my job is to bring music and dance audiences together so that people who go to concerts feel more comfortable watching dance, and people who see mostly dance are more comfortable going to a concert the next time.
It’s crazy that they’re totally separate audiences.
It is the conundrum I am thinking about all the time – my background’s in dance and I love dance, but it was too hard for me to work in dance as somebody who wasn’t the dancer. I feel like dance is slowly dying because their audience is so insular and people get so intimidated by dance, which is strange to me because dance seems to me to be the most accessible art form…it’s just moving your body and everybody understands movement.
I want to start doing concerts where in between sets there would be a ten-minute dance piece on the floor in front of the stage. And I think that might be the solution…literally putting them in front of a new audience.
I think people look at dance as a stem from the modern dance and ballet world but it has so many different facets.
Yeah, like having to sit down and be quiet for an hour and try to really understand something that’s heavy and pick it apart, and I don’t think dance has to be like that. The reason music is so accessible is that you can go to a show late, you can be drinking, you can be talking during the show, it’s totally social. To make dance more social is maybe the way that it is going to survive.
Classical music has this older, subscription-based audience that would go to Lincoln Center and buy a whole year’s worth of subscriptions to shows and people just aren’t doing that anymore. Our generation is used to being able to customize all of their experiences and do whatever they want all the time, and to commit to a year’s worth of shows is something people aren’t doing anymore.
One person who is bridging that gap is Nils Frahm.
Yeah, love Nils Frahm. He plays LPR all the time.
He’s completely unpretentious and is like, “oh! I’m going to play something with a toilet brush!” Or, “oh! If someone texts during my set, it’s going to be in the recording!” And maybe that’s the approach dance needs to take.
Yeah, breaking down those walls and making dance more social and accessible to an audience that doesn’t want to go to a ballet.
How did the name “The Hum” come about?
“The Hum” was named by Hannah Epperson, who was in the first and the third series. I was originally going to name it something that had “femme” in the name, and through conversations with almost every artist who was in that first series…I decided that I didn’t want to have The Hum be something that screamed “Women!” in the title or marketing, because the more I work in the music industry, the more I want to get rid of the fucking double standard of having to say a musician is a woman. It bugs the shit out of me! Even to see “female-fronted,” it bugs me! The word “woman” adds nothing what the music actually sounds like.
There’s no “Man Band” classification.
Yeah, you would never say, “male-fronted” or “male-backed.” If you’re a musician you’re a musician. If you’re a carpenter you’re a carpenter. It doesn’t matter. I got really pissed off about this and posted something on Facebook the other day and my friend Cooper had a really good response. He said, “It’s leftover from a sexist industry. We don’t need to imply that “white male” is the norm and everything else is “other” and needs a further classification.” Also, I think that sometimes when people are using “women” it’s like a marketing ploy of sex appeal in some way.
“Boobs-Fronted Band.”
Exactly! But there is another side to it, which is using “woman” or “female” can be really empowering sometimes. My good friend Mindy who runs Tom Tom Magazine, her tagline for the magazine is “A Magazine About Female Drummers” and that’s really empowering. I think that it’s a balance of using the word “female” as an empowering description and also just deciding to drop it. I see extreme value in both perspectives.
Manhattan Inn has traditionally housed a lot of jazz music, which is so male-dominated, and LPR has had a fair share of electronic, which is similarly a boy’s club…have you run into any issues because of those two genres?
Jazz has been a really sexist genre.
To be fair, I noticed in one interview you said, “Don’t get me started on jazz,” and I thought, “I’m going to get her started on jazz.”
It’s starting to happen. Allison Miller is a fucking awesome drummer and she’s really done her own thing. I just feel like it’s really hard for women to rise in that musical genre, maybe because unless they’re the sexy girl singing Ella Fitzgerald…it’s hard for female musicians who are playing bass or drums to get ahead in any genre.
Electronic music…I don’t know. I really wanted Discwoman to get involved…they’re a collective of DJs that are women…I will get them involved one day. I feel like every electronic musician-
Is male.
Yeah, I think that’s the question. These musicians exist, right? Or are there actually way less electronic artists that are women? Or way less jazz musicians that are women? I don’t think it’s that, I think they just have a hard time breaking through and making shit happen.
I was reading about Vis-à-vis and the importance of the Brooklyn DIY scene was mentioned-but in the past few years we’ve had so many closures: Glasslands, 285 Kent, Death By Audio, Secret Project Robot…
You know what’s funny is that every venue that Vis-à-vis took place in-
Is gone. Are you hopeful for the Brooklyn DIY scene?
The cops really don’t want it around. Very few landlords want it around. Many of these places close because of lack of codes. Manhattan Inn feels very DIY to me. I’m like running out and buying Christmas lights from the dollar store because none of the lights work in the back, you know? I love DIY venues. I think it will always exist. It’s going to migrate neighborhoods…five years ago there were probably 12 venues in Williamsburg and now there’s like, four.
I think it will always be a thing in New York because the music scene is too big here. There are too many kids trying to make it in music here, and that sense of community is such a New Yorker sense of community, it will always be here. It’s just going to move around.
That’s why I like LPR. It’s a very independent music venue. We run our own ticketing, we have amazing relationships with these artists and nurture what they’re doing. It’s sad when a Cameo or Zebulon goes away, because those spaces were really well-run, and the sound was good and it was an amazing place to meet people and hang out and see great music, and those places closed, not for coding but just because the neighborhood got too expensive.
What are some holes in the NYC/Brooklyn scene and music industry, and how do you hope to help fill them?
The idea for The Hum came from a hole I saw a lack of representation of women playing music. I think there’s a void in venues that facilitate interdisciplinary collaboration. What I’m trying to do in dance and music, trying to bring in a bigger audience for dance, I don’t feel like I have space to do that. In most music venues there’s no space for dancers to actually perform in.
You have to have a flat floor, preferably sprung. You have to have enough space, and it’s hard to find places like that, so I’d really lose my mind if I ever found a place like that. It would be a place that every night of the week there would either be a show, or some kind of performance art/comedy thing, or collaborations, dance performances…
Would you consider opening one?
I would love to have a venue. I would love to be a part of something like that, definitely.
What would your dream collaboration for The Hum be?
Karen O, Annie Clarke, Lianne La Havas. Those are my HEROES. I think it’d be cool to put a seasoned older artist with somebody who’s hot right now who’s clearly a derivative of that older artist-
Like Kate Bush.
Yeah, like Kate Bush with Karen O (gestures that her head would explode). Cyndi Lauper with Kimbra. PJ Harvey and Annie Clarke. But that’s how I want to grow The Hum. I’d like to do a mini-festival where the footprint of what I’ve been doing remains: four weeks of new collaborations at Manhattan Inn, shows around town, and then getting enough money to commission one amazing night of big artists collaborating, where I have money to pay for their rehearsal. That would be the vision.
Get your tickets for The Hum here and check out the entire lineup on the offical Hypnocraft website.[/fusion_builder_column][/fusion_builder_row][/fusion_builder_container]
This summer, New York’s own BRAEVES released a new single called “Silver Streets” as a follow up to 2014’s Drifting by DesignEP.
The band bid their farewell to New York last weekend at The Studio at Webster Hall, rounding out a busy year of stellar shows at other venues in the city, including Baby’s All Right, where I first got to meet the guys, Glasslands, and (Le) Poisson Rouge. All of their hard work has led to a major next step, as they’ll be moving to Los Angeles later this month to work on their first full-length record.
[/fusion_builder_column][fusion_builder_column type=”1_1″ background_position=”left top” background_color=”” border_size=”” border_color=”” border_style=”solid” spacing=”yes” background_image=”” background_repeat=”no-repeat” padding=”” margin_top=”0px” margin_bottom=”0px” class=”” id=”” animation_type=”” animation_speed=”0.3″ animation_direction=”left” hide_on_mobile=”no” center_content=”no” min_height=”none”]Derek Tramont, Thomas Mcphillips, Austin Mendenhall, and Ryan Levy at a recording session. Photo by Tim Toda.
At Webster, Snowmine’s Austin Mendenhall stepped in for former member Nick LaFalce, who performs lead guitar on the track.
The song shines, quite literally, with metallic imagery such as, “Silver streets, golden bodies” and “copper in our bones.” Coupled with sleek, otherworldy guitar and bass work, that blend seamlessly, “Silver Streets” is a perfectly warm track for speeding down a country road this fall. With lyrics like, “Take me back to days when I was fearless in your arms/I’ll follow your way home, I’ll follow your way home,” Levy’s dulcet vocals will make you nostalgic for a time that you weren’t even there for.
See the full lyrics on their Bandcamp page, and be on the lookout for a video coming soon. Listen to the track below:
Friday night at the self-proclaimed “art and alcohol” gallery of (le) poisson rouge, Maria Neckam, aka the Brooklyn bred and jazz trained Milán infiltrated the far too sparsely populated space like fluorescent spheres of a bubble gun for her self-titled EP release party. Created in junction with DJ Brian Lindgren (Pax Humana), drummer Chris Berry (Holy Ghost!, Ghost Beach) and drummer Tommy Crane (Half Waif) the 11/11 release merges of the mind of Maria filtered through the creative production skills of Jim Orso (drums for Hot Chip, Holy Ghost! and Rush Midnight).
In a “let’s do this” moment her thin heels and leopard-print blazer were removed and Milán was unconstricted to align movement with alt-electro beats. Her finely tuned style and quirky dance moves evoke the endearing appeal of Björk, and fans of the Annie Clark-personified pop of St. Vincent will be looking to snag the self-titled EP.
With an almost unaware intensity, she let the focused crowd intimately in with the seductively vulnerability of “How could I ever let you come so close, to my heart?” in “Miles Apart.”
In a thrashing “DK6” that leaves you curious and craving what’s next, “Nobody asked you to move in here, nobody asked you to be become me…can’t you see that you hold me back?” jabs Milán.
The energy slowed down for the steady rhythms accelerated by the driving eclectic vocals of the haunting yet soft “25.” “When the world gets too close I can’t feel myself…”
Like the teeming undercurrents of the up and coming next Brooklyn neighborhood, Milán has mainstream appeal for the next era 2015 of kink-tones.
If you crept down the stairs and into the venue at Le Poisson Rouge last Saturday evening, you would’ve heard the disembodied voice of a woman gliding off the walls. It was silvery and sensual and the sprightliness of her breathy singing chilled the space. It was a little after 7:30 and I recognized the voice: Kelsey Bulkin of Made In Heights. And until recently, no one really knew the face behind the voice. It wasn’t until the duo started touring last year that fans who’d been listening to Made In Heights could put a face to both the singer and the DJ.
Made In Heights consists of Alexei Saba Moharjersjasbi (Sabzi) and Kelsey Bulkin; he hails from Seattle, and she, from San Diego. What’s convenient about a group that’s not well known is that the only information you have of them is from what they choose to tell the audience at live shows. It’s sort of ironic because this is a musical pair that garnered their audience through the internet, first through bandcamp, then through Soundcloud. I’d seen Made In Heights twice before, and in both those cases, the crowd was a skimpy handful of die-hard fans, people who might’ve been following Sabzi (he’s also ½ of Blue Scholars) or Kelsey’s creative trajectories since they debuted their first little EP on Bandcamp in 2011. When I got to the venue, I was surprised at how large the crowd was. It was a combination of young college students and people in their late 20s, early 30s, most of whom I assume were there for Tokimonsta (the main act). While the college students floundered wildly around with Sabzi and Kelsey to songs with “heavy drops” like “Wildflowers (Exhale Effect)” and “Murakami,” most if not all of the people surrounding me, seemed unfamiliar with Made In Heights. But strangely, it didn’t diminish the liveliness and energy of Sabzi and Kelsey’s affect towards the crowd.
It’s a funny era we live in these days. While putting music online can reach an indefinite number of computers, there’s still little information on the internet about the musicians that are sharing. So the details that artists choose to share when they have the opportunity to meet their listeners (and new listeners) in real life are crucial. What did Made In Heights choose to share? Sabzi and Kelsey met in New York and are now based in Los Angeles. He does the beats, she does the singing. They don’t know what genre they are so if you can think of a good description, please, do tweet at them @madeinheights. Some of the better suggestions fans have given them include: mythical filth (presumably a play off of the Seattle slang word “filthy”), artisanal (c/t)rap, and beauty slap. I’ve heard Sabzi recycle this script before, and it surprises me how charmed I still am by it.
One thing you should know is that Made In Heights loves synchronized dancing. People who watch Made In Heights will also love synchronized dancing after they see Sabzi and Kelsey busting out unimpressive moves in unison. When you’re watching a DJ and a vocalist—especially when it’s not about EDM, drugs, and light shows—it’s so easy for the set to fall flat, and this is their way around it. Made In Heights also has a particular kind of sound. Their music is lyrically poetic and sonically intoxicating with its juxtaposition of instrumental melodies and synth beats. This combination is what makes their performances interesting. Strip away Sabzi’s efforts, and the show might as well be another intimate acoustic session with Kelsey. Take away Kesley’s singing and the show would just be another experimental electronic set with people writhing into weird shapes. Put the two together and we have this chilling vocal performance alongside some really endearing choreography. By the end of their set, I even felt subtle nudges from my previously stock-still neighbors. Despite not knowing a single verse or who these people on the stage were, they, too, were feeling the endorphins flooding into the crowd.
With the internet and social media, we’ve become a culture that thrives from humanizing our famed musicians and celebrities; the problem with this is that it ends up blurring our opinion of the artist’s talent. After a short 30 minute set, the two snuck off of the stage, and disappeared into the green room. As much as I’d like to know more about Made In Heights—who they are as artists, what they consider their genre to be—it’s also refreshing to know that Made In Heights might not care about those categorizations.
The two will be returning for the CMJ Music Marathon, which takes place October 21-25, 2014. Check out their latest single, “Ghosts” below.
Juana Molina hails from Argentina, and, like the rich, full-bodied Malbecs her homeland is known for, Molina’s tunes sit robustly on any musical pallette. Molina is just as intoxicating, too, an experienced live performer with five records of material to cover, she managed to hit every sensitive nerve, like ripe fruit and tannins lingering on the roof of the mouth.
Molina sings mostly in Spanish, and admittedly, I understand only enough to order confidently (maybe impressively?) from a taco truck. But listening to Molina, little is lost in translation; her experimental, polyrhythmic vocal style doesn’t beg lyrics to be discernible and I suspect that even the fluent folks in the audience at Le Poisson Rouge were listening for the inventive vocal stylings, creative loops, and exuberant expression moreso than lyrics themselves. She acquiesced to the packed audience’s assumed language between songs, her stage banter spoken in warm, sparkling English stage banter with genuine sincerity and humor.
Beyond her impressive, hypnotic vocal stylings, her guitar work was simply breathtaking. Of course, she didn’t play just any guitar; that night, she was strumming a 1966 SG Special – an electric, classic style instrument. Though she vented to the crowd about how everyone has been bugging her to purchase a tuner, Molina’s layered tones rang golden, her old school flair updated within the modern movements.
Juana Molina’s performance was made extra special by how visual and fearlessly romantic it was. She sang graciously yet powerfully in her native tongue. “Eras” brought the crowd into her realm of energy through the velvety smoothness of her voice and melodic beat. As I stood there, I felt a sort of vibrational force wash over me, the rich, textured noises providing an expansive yet swaddling cocoon. No matter how varied these sounds were, they came together with a similar resilience. Her mesmerizing abilities did not stop there– in “Un Dia,” the title track from her 2008 release, she used a loop pedal to create that unique background for the song, layering keyboard atop masterfully. She was very in touch with the details – let it be said that Juana Molina does not mess around with the preciseness of her music. She knew that at one point, her guitar was having trouble tuning because of the air conditioning hitting the strings and delicate wood. Her songs are made more intimate and spiritual because of the relationship she displays with her instruments.
Molina is touring in support of Wed 21, released this past fall. Reaction from her fans? Well worth the five-year wait. Molina’s brilliant dynamism is sure to take audiences on a journey that will feel both spiritual and of this world.
“Our tours are cursed,” Radical Face frontman Ben Cooper explained from his position seated in a chair onstage. Elaborating, he detailed a series of misfortunes including surgery on his head and a recent chiropractor visit for his injured back as an apology for his seated state. This opening remark was an unfortunate foreshadowing for the rest of the concert.
Even before Cooper and the band took the stage, the atmosphere at Le Poisson Rogue was uneasy as the audience endured what at first was a promising opener in Johnny Rodgers, who uses reverberating glass recorded on a loop to enhance his songs. However, after the first track, the novelty and impressiveness of this skill wore off and exposed mediocre lyrics and strange, contorted facial expressions Rodgers displayed while performing. By the end of the gig, the buzz of the audience talking rather than listening was apparent.
Then it was Radical Face’s turn to save the show. Crew aided the band in setting up the stage, scattering tiny, electronic candles throughout the equipment and placing a chair directly behind the leading microphone. Unfortunately for Cooper, his injury made it more difficult to connect with the audience, as they could barely see him from his position so close to the ground. He did make an effort, however, to bridge the gap by engaging in conversation with attendees and explaining the meaning behind each song before performing it. On the opposite end, the audience responded in unfunny, unnecessary shouting matches, hopelessly trying to communicate with Cooper, forgetting that they were attending a concert and that dialogue between the artist and the crowd in a packed space is pretty much useless.
In accordance with the “tour curse,” Cooper snapped a string partway through the set and try-too-hard-overdressed-drummer whose name I can’t even remember was recruited to fix the broken string while Cooper covered Sinead O’Connor’s “Nothing Compares 2 U.” Cooper explained the misfortune by stating, “Nothing we do is planned. We decided you pay money to watch us practice.” The self-deprecation was meant to be humanizing and funny but came off as unprofessional and juvenile. This coincided with occasional jokes about how depressing and dark each of the songs are and declaring all of their romantic relationships unsuccessful. The string replacement itself was an awkward moment that was next filled by the “former professional yo-yo-er” drummer’s yo-yo performance. Sadly, the tricks were the most impressive portion of the show.
The performance continued in the same shaky way it began, with the band not quite sounding like themselves. No one expects artists to sound the same live as they do on recorded albums, but they were so far off the mark it was depressing. Radical Face is by no means a barrier-breaking band, but the greatest strength they possess is that their songs sound so pretty. The live version just doesn’t transfer that sound. The littlest salvation came when the band united as one and jammed out on several tracks, with swooping guitar chords that — albeit simple, basic skills — were effective in rallying the crowd. Crowd-favorite tracks such as “Wrapped in Piano Strings” and “Always Gold” elicited joy and nostalgia from the crowd.
When it came time for Cooper to introduce the band’s most popular track, “Welcome Home,” he declared that he needed some assistance for the crowd to sing along to the chorus: on the recorded track, there are multiple voices present and on stage there is just Cooper’s. He informed the crowd that the drummer “is kind of a dick” and compares each city’s rendition of the song, that they should sing as loudly and as heartfelt as they could. This seemed to convince them to ban together, as many voices filled the small space when the chorus came around. However, not even the nostalgia for the hit and assistance from the crowd could save the performance.
Radical Face gave it their best effort, and they truly did try. Unfortunately, this time it just wasn’t enough.[/fusion_builder_column][/fusion_builder_row][/fusion_builder_container]
After thoroughly enjoying last summer’s set at Webster Hall, I was pumped to see Liars not once but twice this past weekend. The first show was in the Met’s Temple of Dendur, which is about as epic as a setting gets. The band literally played amongst the ruins of the monument, built in 15 BC by Petronius, Roman governor of Egypt and relocated to the museum’s Sackler Wing in 1978 after being gifted to the United States to save it from flooding created by the Aswan Dam. The acoustics were either awesome or jarringly echoic depending on where you were standing, and where you were standing depended on gallery officials adhering to fire codes, but hey. The trippy projections flashing behind Angus Andrew and company were probably more than twenty feet wide and plenty enthralling if your vantage point was less-than ideal for watching the band.
The following night, Liars visited (le) poisson rouge for a show that by then was starting to seem like it had been cursed by King Tut himself. First, the venue changed from Brooklyn’s Masonic Temple for unspecified reasons. Scheduled openers Lower Dens dropped off the bill around the time the venue change was announced. Doldrums stepped up to occupy the opening spot but were foiled by the theft of Airick Woodhead’s laptop and passport, so the Toronto band never made it to Brooklyn, and Liars took the stage promptly at 8:30.
Both sets included songs from WIXIW, Liars most-recent (and most electronic) release. Considering that they’d already toured in support of the record, it was surprising they were doing these shows at all; as it turns out, the purpose of both was to debut all-new material. The new songs are, once again, heavy on the electronics and driven by pounding beats, but possess a darkness and urgency not unlike the mood of 2004’s witch-worshipping classic They Were Wrong, So We Drowned. The only actual foray into that material was during the encore at LPR, which ended with crowd pleaser “Broken Witch”. There were no encores at the Met so for those who, like myself, had attended both, it felt like a treat.
You can watch a video for “Who Is The Hunter” (from WIXIW) here. Below, check out video of a new song, which according to their somewhat cryptic handwritten setlist might be called something like “Can’t Hear”. It’s far more relaxed and sparse than some of the other new stuff they played, lest ye naysayers worry Liars are losing their edge. The fact that Angus Andrew is pushing forty at this point doesn’t seem to be slowing him down at all. They’ll be playing MoMA PS1’s Warm Up this season on August 31st.
There isn’t really a noise, audible to human ears or otherwise, safe from the all-absorbing sonic stylings of experimental electronic duo Matmos, whose ninth studio LP The Marriage of True Minds is out on Thrill Jockey later this month. On Monday M.C. Schmidt and Daniel Drew dropped into (le) poisson rouge, offering a rather psychedelic testament to their inquisitive and avant-garde creative approach.
It’s hard to define the kind of person who’d be fascinated enough by these processes (not the mention the songs produced by them) to attend their live recreation, though to say fans of Matmos tend to be sort of geeky is probably an obvious start. I never know what to expect in terms of set-up at LPR; the versatile venue sometimes offers seating, sometimes standing only, and the stage migrates throughout the club (my personal favorite set-up being in-the-round). When I bought a ticket at the door seating was offered so I took it, figuring I’d be better able to focus if I wasn’t relegated to a table-less corner where I’d be subject to constant jostling.
Focus proved to be the best asset in truly appreciating the performances that evening, kicked off by Dana Wachs (who performs under the moniker Vorhees). Wachs has been recording as Vorhees since 2005, but her live performances tend to be attached to projects other than her own – she’s soundtracked everything from short films to dance performances at PS122 to fashion shows for Rachel Comey, Imitation of Christ, Y & Kei, Wink, Sebastian Pons and Jess Holzworth. It’s worth mentioning that her resume includes production work for Cat Power, M.I.A. and St. Vincent (among others), though in a way it’s misleading to group her with those artists. The vision she seeks with her explorations in Vorhees is totally separate – a turbulent study in soft electronic loops, her hushed sing-song layered with washes of white noise, droning guitar and loops she creates in front of the audience, rather than relying on a laptop filled with pre-recorded beats. The result is towering but overtakes the listener in subtle builds. As the lone performer on stage, Wachs is a stark but mesmerizing character, releasing bursts of sonance in controlled fashion, giving each element of the track its own time to resonate before adding another airy strata.
Horse Lords approach from almost the opposite angle, attacking the senses with an onslaught of dense guitar work and pounding polyrhythms delivered by not one but two live drummers, all members of the band performing with scientific focus. That intensity revealed much about the intention behind their work in terms of both composing songs and performing them live; their material hinges on intonation tuning, in which note frequencies relate to mathematical ratios. Even if that concept is a bit over the heads of most casual listeners (mine included) the essence of what it accomplishes is readily apparent. Lead guitarist Owen Gardner actually had to add and painstakingly reposition his frets to accommodate the precise tunings, and the resulting uniqueness of the guitar sound is easy enough to perceive even without calculating algebraic equations. Their work draws on disparate influences, incorporating brass instruments and computers alike. For all of the headiness, though, Horse Lords do not fail to offer something that seems vital rather than removed from itself. If the music itself did not feel so immediate, it would be in danger of becoming obscured by its own elaborate nature. That’s where Horse Lords really get it right – by keeping the music lively they’re free to explore, to take their most intricate concepts to their fullest expression, without losing accessibility.
It’s pretty obvious why a duo like Matmos would be interested in taking Horse Lords under their avant-garde wings (in fact, Horse Lords will continue to open with the band as they embark on a US tour, and Gardner makes a guest appearance on the new record); one can just imagine the hours of music nerd shoptalk going on without end. One can also imagine the collaborative thoughts flying, oddball concepts for albums of the future taking shape, philosophies being debated and debunked, weird noises coming from nowhere or everywhere. It’s easy to imagine because everything Matmos does is based on divine collaboration – with each other, with other musicians, and with objects in the surrounding world. Sometimes that takes the shape of recording an album composed of sounds culled from liposuction surgeries. Sometimes it’s about making a recording in a cow’s uterus and dedicating it to someone who inspired them. And sometimes it means rounding up test subjects, putting them on their backs on a table in a room with with soft red lighting, covering their eyes with two halves of a pingpong ball, and pumping white noise into the headphones they’re wearing while telepathically projecting the concept of the album into the “percipient” brain.
And naturally, that’s exactly what Matmos did, encouraging these newest collaborators to hum or sing whatever sounds or melodies played through their empty, sensory deprived psyches, to describe objects or ideas that did the same. Conceptually, it explores the Ganzfeld effect as much as it attempts to prove or disprove the validity of extra-sensory perception. Sonically, Matmos take a wide berth in interpreting the data they collected and translating it to music. The most obvious difference from their previous work is the appearance of predominant vocals from a slew of guest artists (Dan Deacon, Angel Deradoorian, Jen Wasner to name a fraction) as well as from the members of Matmos themselves, harmonizing on record for the first time in their twenty-year career. But all the quirky sound collage Matmos is known for provides the backdrop – amplified rubber bands as bass lines, sloshing water, sirens, bells, and telephones, tap dancers dancing across a concrete floor. The shuffle of these myriad textures creates a ceaseless movement that makes it easy to forget it was conceived using sensory deprivation. “Teen Paranormal Romance” is ecstatic and burbling and awkward, less like the Twilight saga and more like the aural equivalent of two adolescent spectres fumbling in the dark. “Tunnel” drops out at its most frenzied moment to a creepy whispering, then speeds off again into some mysterious light, all ragged guitars and pitch-shifted synths. The album closes with a schizophrenic cover of The Buzzcocks’ “ESP” and the words “So… think”; the vinyl version has a locked groove of white noise to allow its listeners time to do just that and see what visions come along.
In a live setting, Matmos couldn’t possibly go to all the trouble of recreating the experiment, and if any ticket-holders had been asked to listen to nothing and just envision a Matmos concert, a good portion might have asked for the money back. Instead they opened with an expansive, lysergic iteration of “Very Large Green Triangles” replete with incantatory instructions on how to meditate. There were, of course, hallucinatory projections flickering across the screen behind the musicians, containing visions of, yes, green triangles. There were also mystical hand gestures. This went on for roughly thirteen blissed minutes during which I was exceedingly grateful to be sitting in a chair.
[jwplayer config=”AF01 YT” mediaid=”2286″]
The rest of the set was truly a retrospective of some of the band’s most playful moments, including material that went as far back as 1998’s Quasi-Objects, during which Schmidt blew up a pink balloon and manipulated its surface and the air within it matter-of-factly, as though it were a more conventional instrument. A song from 2001’s A Chance to Cut Is a Chance to Cure featured some queasiness-inducing projections of someone’s insides, yet somehow retained a potent danceability. Despite the fact that Matmos have made a name for themselves as diligent sound collectors as much as musicians, they don’t take themselves too seriously. It was delightful to witness such creative music-making, and easy to laugh along with with their stage banter. One particularly tender moment came when Schmidt realized he was missing an adapter; Drew produced one from his pocket, and Schmidt quipped that it was a dream come true to have a boyfriend who kept such necessities so handy. Up to that point, I’d never considered that the two were a couple, but now it’s easy to see them as insatiable cohorts, conspiring to dream up their lofty album concepts and outlandish recording techniques, and working fearlessly together to share those visions with the world. In that way, The Marriage of True Minds could double as a title for the group’s autobiography as well as its latest record, their perfect synergy and avid curiosity being the impetus for their ground-breaking, genre-defying output.[/fusion_builder_column][/fusion_builder_row][/fusion_builder_container]
In January, Fat Possum will release Lysandre, the debut record of Christopher Owens. Owens will then play two back-to-back shows at Bowery Ballroom. In all likelihood, these shows will sell out. The reason that the music world is waiting so eagerly for this particular singer/songwriter’s first solo record is because Christopher Owens is best known as half of highly celebrated indie rock band Girls.
Christopher Owens at Le Poisson Rouge, image courtesy of wagz2it
Formed in San Francisco 2009 with bassist and producer Chet “JR” White, Girls became a huge and nearly instantaneous success. Part of the fascination no doubt stemmed from Owens’ intriguing personal history, having been raised in the Children of God cult until he was sixteen. But it was the songs that the duo created that kept audiences enthralled, their pop simplicity resonating with fans and critics alike. The effortless, often sunny chords and uncomplicated lyrics, simultaneously fun and dark, characterized the three releases the band would produce over the next few years – Album in 2009, Broken Dreams Club in 2010, and 2011’s Father, Son, Holy Ghost – before Owens announced via Twitter last summer that he would be leaving the band. Now, six months later, Owens will make good on his promise to continue to write, record and play music, but this time, he’s on his own.
With Owens poised to take this leap, what can fans expect? Oddly enough, Lysandre is a strange little epilogue to the Girls saga; it’s a loosely themed tour diary of the band’s first international outing, during which Owens met and fell in love with the French girl the album is named for. It features all the sentimentality one might see coming with such a synopsis – he describes the tender details of their first encounters and the painful realizations he came to as it ended. And in between he questions his validity as a songwriter, marvels at the cities of the world, and swoons about a million times over, all in the key of A.
I caught what I considered a slightly more than mildly awkward solo performance a few weeks ago at Le Poisson Rouge, only his second solo appearance. That’s using the term ‘solo’ a bit loosely since he was accompanied by a sort of sad looking plant, a keyboardist, a drummer, two back up singers (one of which is his new love interest) and a wizard-esque, white-bearded woodwind player who was literally playing a different instrument almost every time I looked at him. More often than not, he trilled the recurring “Lysandre’s Theme” on his rather jazzy flute. Owens and company proceeded to play his record from beginning to end, signifying further Owens’ clear intention to present the work as a whole rather than as a set of separately satisfying and sonically distinguished gems in the manner of his work with Girls. While this is admirable in its ambition, it made the material a bit harder to digest, especially coming from someone who has shown a bit of a genius as far as composing perfectly pitched pop nuggets is concerned.
The performance was awkward because everyone wanted Owens to succeed. There’s no denying Owens as an artist and when he left Girls he left the world hungry for great records that could have been. But it’s also frustrating to know that he has chosen to make indulgent and somewhat gawky folk music when he’s capable of exploring the same themes in a far more palatable way. It’s more than a little uncomfortable to watch someone coming to terms with a painful past, confronting strange desires and issues of inadequacy. It wasn’t that the music he made under the Girls moniker was less raw or honest, but the sonic intricacies of his former project provided a more clever mask for its coarser sentiments. Without that veil, Owens’ musings tend to go from earnest to embarrassing.
A perfect example of that came about halfway through the set, when Owens performed “Love Is In The Ear Of The Listener”. The lyrics are a series of questions posed from songwriter to himself regarding the necessity and worth of his work, but it sounds like something an aspiring fifteen-year-old poet might write. He wonders if everyone’s tired of hearing love songs, if he’s just a bad songwriter in general. It came across like a questionnaire Owens might send to blogs with promo copies of Lysandre, and even had the audience chuckling at certain lines. It’s entirely possible that Owens is going for a tongue-in-cheek exploration of his insecurities. It could be that he’s not actually worried about his abilities at all; someone with Owens’ degree of critical acclaim must feel that he can’t totally fail. The conclusion he comes to in the song is that it doesn’t matter anyway since he’s doomed to write what he feels regardless of what people want or expect. In this way, it acts as a sort of disclaimer for the entirety of the new material, a challenge even.
Owens closed out the set with an encore of iconic covers from Bob Dylan, Simon & Garfunkel, Cat Stevens, The Everly Brothers, and Donovan. By this point I was almost embittered enough to yell out “Cover a Girls song!” knowing that it would be completely inappropriate and even unfair to do so. But the whole thing felt like Owens had left Girls to become a glorified wedding singer – and the tables LPR had set up around the stage did nothing to diffuse that impression. Owens picked celebrated songs that definitely seemed autobiographical, communicating his fears of striking out on his own (“Wild World”), holding specific relevance to his break from JR White and Girls (“Don’t Think Twice It’s Alright”), and fleeing from the only family he knew when he was still a teenager (“The Boxer”) but also belie his fascination with classic love songs (“Let It Be Me”) and folksy caricature (“Lalena”). If these celebrated songwriting heights act as reference point for Owens’ aspirations, his goals certainly cannot be loftier. One can almost parse the moments when Lysandre makes good on these objectives but the record I’ll be more excited to hear will chronicle this current solo voyage, rather than act as a sentimental look back at the artist’s time with a band I’ll miss for a while still to come.
CMJ has come and gone but the week proved to be a memorable one filled with discovering new artists and rediscovering old favorites.
If you’re like me and are just under the 21+ age limit of many of that week’s shows, finding something, anything, to attend proved to be a truly ridiculous adventure. Fortunately, some fantastic acts took pity upon the children, including Sea Wolf, a band that falls into the “old favorites” category and have been on the back-burner of my iPod playlists.
On the chilly Friday evening at the tail end of the music marathon,Sea Wolf, joined by Hey Marseilles and Southern folkie Jim White, graced the intimate stage at (le) poisson rouge. The red-tinged, smoky atmosphere of the venue had been filled to the brim with too-cool patrons who held their half-empty glasses and fashionably dressed bodies like they were at an art show, mulling over the artist’s intentions and so on.
Hey Marseilles, a seven-piece Seattle outfit, entered a stage filled with a mess of string instruments that were put well to use during their frantic yet earnest set. Their energy and heavy focus on a strong string section gave them the vibe of a softcore Mumford and Sons that hasn’t been enraged by the roughness of life while the musicality and lyrical content felt reminiscent of The Decemberists (this is a comparison that is driven home by the insanely similar vocal tone Hey Marseilles’ lead singer has to Colin Meloy). Towards the end of their setlist that included mostly new songs from a forthcoming album release, it was difficult not to smile during “Rio,” an old song of theirs that comes complete with a festive audience clap-along.
The positive energy of Hey Marseilles made way for Jim Whites typical Southern folk take on Jesus and highways and tumbleweeds over crunchy guitar riffs. With his twangy accent and quippy asides in-between songs (“Imagine if your dad was up here smiling stoned. That’s kind of what you got with me”) made him a fun and personable presence on stage. A highlight, in between all that talk of Jesus and tumbleweeds, came in the form of a song written for Kimya Dawson titled “Keep It Meaningful.”
While the audience lagged a bit for the first half of White’s set, the energy spiked during his ‘rock the vote’ speech that included his sage advice for everyone to ‘find a drunk and get him sober enough to vote.’ It was a perfect lead into the long, related tale he tells in his song “Newspaper,” which ended a set that felt like it had just begun.
Finally, Sea Wolf came on after a break that dragged on in between sets. Enthusiasm lifted once again as they jumped right into a rousing set filled with edge, bite, and all the folky goodness that had been presented throughout the night. While they may have not had the same joy or fervor as openers Hey Marseilles, who really stole the show with their genuine excitement to be up there, Sea Wolf felt exhilarating and charming and earnest, as they’ve elicited in the past. With a mix of old and new songs, the band continuously delivered flawless musicality until lead singer Alex Brown Church forgot the lyrics of a few older tunes, including “I Made a Resolution.” The band and the audience laughed along with Church and the show continued with its regularly scheduled indie joy.
After their final song, a thrilling version of “You’re a Wolf,” Sea Wolf returned for a warm encore with the song “Saint Catherine St.” It felt like a good-bye but not to the band — it was a good-bye to the weird week that was CMJ Music Marathon right before Saturday’s own warm encore and final hurrah.
