Tag: Peaking Lights

RSVP HERE: Automatic stream via Bandcamp + MORE

Automatic are an LA post-punk three piece composed of Izzy Glaudini on synths/vocals, Lola Dompé on drums/vocals, and Halle Saxon on bass/vocals. Their 2019 debut record Signal sounds like Suicide and Broadcast formed a supergroup to play at the end of a David Lynch film.

I spent a month in LA last February and my only regret is not catching their minimal synth soaked vibes live. Luckily they’re playing a few Bandcamp livestreams – the first being tonight at 7pm ET! – leading up to the release of their remix album out March 26, featuring new versions of Signal tracks from artists like Sudan Archives, Peaking Lights, John Dwyer, and Peanut Butter Wolf. We chatted with Automatic about records they will never get tired of, watching The Parent Trap 500 times, and custom fretless bass magic.

AF: How was the writing and recording process of your debut record?

HS: It was such a blast. We recorded with my boyfriend Joo-Joo Ashworth at Studio 22 and it was just so fun that we’re doing it again for album #2.

IG: It’s interesting to write so collaboratively because ideas evolve quickly and change as they’re passed between members of the band. You learn to be open to songs evolving. And we’re all pretty close so it’s fun. 

LD: Recording is my favorite part of the whole process because you get to really hear your song for the first time and add all the fun details. Writing with Halle and Izzy is amazing.  We’ve always made an effort to create a safe and fun space for writing. I think we work really well together, and songwriting pretty much happens very naturally. 

AF: How did your upcoming remix album come together?

IG: Peanut Butter Wolf, who runs [our] label [Stones Throw], suggested it as something to release during these unholy Corona Times.  We contacted artists we knew and loved and had them rework the songs however they wanted. Remixes are fun because other people do all the work. 

AF: What are your favorite pieces of gear? 

HS: My favorite piece of gear is my old Egmond bass that someone manually ripped the frets out of. I don’t play it anymore cuz I changed its magic strings and now it sounds terrible. But it’s a relic that I’ll keep forever and has nothing but also everything to do with my current bass sound.

IG: Maracas, the Holy Grail reverb, and my Moog Sub25 synth.

LD: I just superglued a Roland trigger to my kick drum and I love it! You can make it trigger any sound you like. 

AF: What non-musical things inspire you?

IG: My boyfriend has a cat named Pepe, and he’s got such a lust for life. Prowling animals in general.

LD: Fashion, movies and nature.

AF: What movies would you watch over and over again?

HS: Izzy and I both watch the LOTR trilogy on a regular basis.

IG: The sweet inner child in me likes LOTR and anything with magic. The dark demon inside wants to watch American Psycho or Repulsion. 

LD: I watched The Parent Trap probably 500 times from age 9 to 11. These days I like to watch a movie once… unless it’s Love Actually around Christmas time. 

AF: What’s a record that you’ll never get sick of?

HS: I’ll never get sick of Neu! or Suicide self-titled albums.

IG: David Bowie’s LOW.

LG: David Bowie’s The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust.

AF: What are your favorite bands to play with and/or see live?

HS: I think we all agree: Bauhaus. But I also loved watching Black Marble every night, one of my favorite bands.

IG: Yeah! Also, hmm. John Dwyer is always a maniac. He practices in the room across from us at our rehearsal space so we get to hear free Oh Sees shows.

LD: Oh Sees are always fun, and I definitely never thought I would get to open for Bauhaus! I got to play with my friend’s band, Body Double, and I was super impressed by their music and show. 

AF: What was your last show before COVID?

HS: Opening for Shopping at 1720 in Los Angeles! We had just circled back to LA and were about to pass it again when shit hit the fan. So we were extremely lucky in that scenario! I know a lot of people that were caught in terrible tour situations that day that basically everything shut down. 

AF: What’s the most important thing you’ve learned in the past year? 

HS: That capitalism is killing the earth and humans (duh, but I didn’t really get it before).

IG: I second that. I got pretty heavy into social/political theory. Chomsky, Marx, Foucault, Zizek. On a ‘chiller’ level, I got into yoga and meditation. 

LD: Staying open and curious and learning to love myself more. 

AF: What are your hopes for the next year? Next 5 years? 

HS: That everyone stops using Amazon.

LD: That people respect the earth and each other way more, so that humans, nature and animals can get their basic needs met. 

IG: Yeah it would be great if humanity stopped cannibalizing itself. But I’m down to make the soundtrack to whatever unfolds. 

RSVP HERE for Automatic via Bandcamp on 2/12 at 7pm ET.

More great livestreams this week…

2/12 Teeburr, Kola Champagne, Survivor Guilt (DJ Set)  via Elsewhere TV. 6pm Et, RSVP HERE 

2/12 Hyphenate with No Age’s Randy Randall, DJ sets by Action Bronson, Japanese Breakfast, Laura Jane Grace & more via Vans Channel 66 “On The Air.” 11am ET RSVP HERE

2/13 Proper, Eli¡ via BABY.tv. 6pm ET, $5, RSVP HERE

2/13 Mogwai via their website. 3pm ET, £15.00, RSVP HERE

2/13 Yeek, Jay Som, Ginger Root, Sosupersam via YouTube (88rising Lunar New Year). 9pm ET, RSVP HERE

2/14 Smashing Pumpkins, AWOLNATION, Portugal. The Man, Twin Peaks & more via JBTV Revolution Television Virtual Music Festival. 3pm ET, RSVP HERE

2/15 Shelter Dogs via FLTV. 8pm ET, RSVP HERE

2/16 Talib Kweli book launch via MURMRR. 7:30pm ET, $33, RSVP HERE

2/18 GZA, Scott Bolton, Sudan Archives, Quintron’s Weather Warlock, Via Imara via Atlas Obscura Rogue Routes. 8pm ET, RSVP HERE

Audiofemme’s Favorite Albums of 2012 (So Far)

It’s July, a month in which listing the best albums of the year so far has become nearly as ubiquitous in the blogosphere as making a list of the best albums of the year in December. Here at Audiofemme, we aren’t so much into ranking the releases of the last six months as we are simply highlighting the music that’s made us super excited to be doing what we’re doing. The following list is by no means comprehensive – we really need some more time with the new Spiritualized record to wrap our brains around it. We can barely keep up with the bi-monthly output of, say, Ty Segall or Family Perfume. We’re saving ourselves on that Sigur Ros album til we see them live in Prospect Park at the end of this month. Dirty Projectors’ Swing Lo Magellan deserves a whole essay rather than a brief blurb. And you’re probably already tired of hearing about how great Grimes is, so we took a mini-break from extolling her virtues.  We have a feeling we’ll still be raving over the following selections in six months, so you’ve got plenty of time to run down to the record store and buy us some vinyl before the holidays hit.

Death Grips – The Money Store: Zach Hill’s newest side project melts faces in a way that last year’s Exmilitary only hinted was possible. Its innovative melding of experimental hip-hop rhythms and aggressive lyrical flow, paired with rapid-fire samples and grinding electronics manages to harness an intense energy while avoiding the pitfalls of akin genres which can be grating, uncreative, and way overhyped (coughcoughdubstepcough). It’s hard to get over an opening scorcher like “Get Got” (especially when producer Andy Morin turns up the echo on Stefan Burnett’s staccato “stopstopstopstopstopstopstop”) but the album is full of dark gems and deep jams. Fuzzy gongs resonate through “Double Helix”, detached blurbs of sampled pop keys bubble out over “Hustle Bones”, “Fuck That’s” bouncy bongos back Burnett’s riotous yells, gloried synth hooks adorn “Bitch Please”. The group will release a companion album, No Love, in the fall of this year, so it will be interesting to see how the two albums play off one another. Not to mention we’ve got our fingers crossed for an insane tour.

Purity Ring – Shrines: What began as a mysterious and infectious single from a band with the same name as a nearly forgotten emo-punk outfit has transcended its steady trickle of carefully guarded tracks into an auspicious debut that crackles and explodes. The band’s innovative live show is just one angle from which they’ve perfected their aesthetic, and every moment on Shrines feels like magic. Megan James and Corin Roddick deftly transform what are essentially pop songs into something closer to fairy tales, helped by James’ abstract poetics and Roddick’s well-timed production. Album standout “Fineshrines” is a perfect example of the way the two work together, and it still breaks my brain after about a thousand listens, somehow capturing exactly what I always want to feel in song form.

Friends – Manifest!: Anticipation for the debut from Brooklyn-based band Friends began building last year with the release of their single “I’m His Girl”, quite possibly the best argument for open relationships to garner any sort of popularity since TLC’s “Creep”. With that kind of momentum, there’s always a danger that a band might not live up to the hype. But Friends have offered a collection of songs that are not only ultra-catchy and party-ready but also delve into complex topics like female relationships and self-respect with surprising intelligence. Initial fears that lead singer Samantha Urbani’s vocals might at times become grating or that her hip-hop influenced style might lead to some embarrassing moments á la Blondie’s “Rapture” are quickly put to ease – the girl not only has style for miles but a strong set of pipes as well.

Mac DeMarco – Rock and Roll Night Club: In March Captured Tracks released Canadian creepster Mac DeMarco’s seedy, darkly-tinged debut in which he “recorded a whole bunch of songs on a 4-track, slowed them down, sang like Elvis, and slowed that down a little bit too”. The result is presented as an artifact from another universe where radio a.) still exists b.) dials from grimy “96.7 The Pipe” to groovy “106.2 The Breeze” and c.) plays nothing but blocks of Mac DeMarco tracks. The result makes me wish DeMarco would stalk me. I’d pretend I didn’t like it, but I’d start spending more time in dark alleys hoping I’d catch him in the act.  Though DeMarco’s approach is sometimes comical and his live presence purposely pushes the awkward, the languid guitar riffs do feel like something of a lost transmission from an alternate reality where pop music has been distorted for the better.  If Rock and Roll Night Club were a physical location, I’d invoke 30 Rock’s Liz Lemon by repeatedly saying “I want to go to there” until I was transported.  Fortunately, the album does aurally what science has yet to accomplish.

Phédre – Phédre: For a band that pretty much came out of nowhere (actually, it was Toronto), Phédre has managed to blow us away. Their self-titled debut is loaded with infectious production but sealed with the gritty kiss of DIY ethos. The trio (formed by Airick Woodhead, April Aliermo, and Daniel Lee) has created a perfect balance of hyperactive hooks and slowed-down sludge, while distorted, bleary male and female vocals act as oozing cherry on the melted sundae of it all. There’s rapping, there’s punk rock, and there’s lots of sexual innuendos and nods to mythology. Listening to this record feels like taking part in an orgy without the messy and awkward reality of one. What should be a hot mess is actually mesmerizing, an effect enhanced by the feeling that the band never takes themselves too seriously due to a preference for nonsense and debauchery.

Peaking Lights – Lucifer: Having a five-month old son hasn’t slowed Aaron Coyes and Indra Dunis down one bit. They’re still touring and have just released a new album that sees them further exploring the experimental electronic routes they’ve breached since forming their band. Lucifer is loop-laden, playful, and showcases Peaking Lights’ trademark fuzzy disco dub on most backing tracks, but there’s more sensitive material here as well. The couple’s tribute to their son, Miko, appears early in the album as a pretty little piano ditty. After dabbling in these lovely, lazy beginnings, the back half of the record lands the listener squarely in Peaking Lights’ wheelhouse, with Coyes’ oscillating samples and eclectic, watery beats pinning down Dunis’ smoky, echoic vocals. It’s the perfect follow-up to last year’s breakout 936 and an automatically wistful portrait of the band at this moment in their careers and personal lives.

Radiation City – Cool Nightmare: This little noise-pop gem was initially circulated via bandcamp by the Portland based quintet. It’s the follow-up to a critically acclaimed debut, and the band’s pride in the new work shows – they released gorgeous physical copies on their own label (Apes Tapes), with laser-cut sleeve sheathed milk-white vinyl and a gold cassette tape being among the purchasing options. But it’s the music therein that’s truly mesmerizing. Though guitarist Cameron Spies’ vocals make laconic appearances from time to time, it is the haunting, distant coos by Lizzy Ellison that stick indelibly in one’s grey matter; standout track “Eye of Yours” blends these two elements to perfection upon a palette of ominous piano plunking that blossoms into sunny trumpets and twangy guitar. That piano, by the way, was a decrepit artifact from drummer Randy Bemrose’s basement and became the inspiration for the whole album.  Every sound it makes as at deteriorates is part of the auditory landscape on Cool Nightmare, the cover of which it graces. The band laid the ancient instrument to rest in the video for lead-off single “Find It Of Use”.

Frankie Rose – Interstellar: As a former member of several prolific noise pop acts (Vivian Girls, Dum Dum Girls, and Crystal Stilts) one might expect Frankie Rose’s second solo album to be very much in that same sort of vein – jangly guitars, vocal bravado, and pounding drums. But Interstellar sees Rose scale these elements back just enough to set the work totally apart. Her energetic nods to new wave, the vaguely cosmic theme, and cohesive production are perfect foils for the strength of  Rose’s songwriting, notable in that it showcases the first moments in which she’s allowed herself to explore a more vulnerable musical persona.  But the songs here are anything but wallflower’s anthems; she challenges listeners in lead-off track “Know Me” to drop the pigeonholing game for a moment and examine the depth in what she’s presented.  And really, there’s so many hazy, wonderful layers in these tracks that it would be a disservice to oneself not to obey her.

Chromatics – Kill For Love: Johnny Jewel and friends are back after a five-year hiatus during which director Nicolas Winding Refn showed the world their merits by featuring Jewel’s work in his critically acclaimed movie Drive. The band has eschewed the gloss of their 2007 dark disco classic Night Drive for material that is still tightly constructed and very assured but isn’t afraid of its imperfections. It begins with a cover of Neil Young’s “Into the Black” which sets the tone for some incredibly macabre moments made all the more heavy by Ruth Radelet’s haunting vocals. At an hour and a half (scaled down from an alleged thirty-six tracks that the band composed) Kill For Love is almost epic for an electronic album, and weaves a peculiar and solemn beauty through its seventeen tracks. Within this moody context, slightly more hopeful offerings like the title track or “At The Door” glisten and radiate. The record as a whole makes the more lazily produced bedroom pop of the moment seem like the equivalent of a blank stare.

Liars – WIXIW: Liars are well known for exploring spaces and ideas which other bands fear to broach, and in the past that experimentation has manifested itself in layers of thunderous drums, menacing riffs, and hair-raising incantations or equally chilling falsetto. Their sixth studio release, WIXIW (pronounced “Wish You”) is more measured and reserved. The layers are there but they’re more delicate and subtle, taking time to unfurl and mature. Pegged pretty accurately as the band’s foray into electronic music, WIXIW still concerns itself with motifs the band has explored for ten years now, but approaches them from a completely different angle. It’s refreshing not just within Liars’ oeuvre, but against most any album with similar sonic aim. WIXIW proves that electronic production shouldn’t be written off by fans of more traditional music making; in hands so well versed in heavier-hitting rock, the outcome transcends mere curiosity and becomes something astonishing unto itself.

 

SHOW REVIEW: Unsound Fest w/ LXMP, Peaking Lights, Maria Minerva

In every high school there’s that one weird kid, usually super smart, creative, or both, that no one can seem to make any sense of. They have bizarre tastes and even more bizarre habits, and you’re so fascinated by these that no one really wants to stop this kid from, say, building a real live flea circus in the cafeteria. Then you find out the kid is from some Eastern European country, and though nothing could ever explain that kid’s behaviors, suddenly they make more sense.

Poland’s Unsound Festival is the collection of events most analogous to that kid. Seeking to showcase avant-garde, experimental, underground electronic acts from all over the world, in May they unleashed a bevvy of eclectic performers on the city in as many as twenty events and panel discussions over the course of five days. The greatest thing about Unsound is the way it appropriates government funding (Polish government funding, that is) to introduce Central and Eastern European acts to the US that otherwise could never visit or tour here. They take that ethos one step further and present them in expertly curated collaborations with US artists of similar ilk. This is the third year that Unsound has brought its extraordinary program from Minsk to NYC, and this year’s acts remained challenging if still rooted in the melodic and danceable aspects of electronic experimentation.

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Peaking Lights at Lincoln Center

I was only able to see two performances, but they were both noteworthy. On Thursday, Lincoln Center’s David Rubenstien Atrium hosted a free Peaking Lights show with openers LXMP. LXMP are two guys from Warsaw whose love of synths and robotic vocals seemingly informs everything they do; for the showcase they covered Herbie Hancock’s Future Shock with bits of evocative improvisation. I’ve had a bit of trouble listening to the band’s original material; the music on their myspace (which still exists!) and a video posted to Unsound’s facebook makes them seem like a hardcore electronic noise band much more abrasive than the band I saw. On the one hand, the freeform electro-funk of Hancock’s breakthrough ’83 album seems like a good fit for a band like LXMP, who also eschew more straightforward composition. On the other hand, their interpretations bordered a level of cheesiness possibly stemming from the fact that Future Shock, while a landmark in the melding of electronic elements with jazz sensibility, is now thirty years old and thus a bit dated. If nothing else, though, seeing this band pay homage to a record that influenced them and likely hundreds of acts within the genre offered a sense of perspective, and it was entertaining to see LXMP’s enthusiasm, whether it was due to a love of Hancock or giddiness at playing a show in the US.

Peaking Lights was a definite change of pace, the only real similarity being a fetishistic adoration for vintage synths. I’d seen them play a great set at SXSW that was unfortunately neutered by time constraints, so I was hoping for a more extended set list that – fingers crossed – included expansive love anthem “Amazing & Wonderful”. Again, I was denied, but can forgive the band that fact since their focus is clearly shifting to the upcoming release of their latest album Lucifer, which will likely explore the utmost depths of bleary, slowed disco beats. Rainbow-toned lights arced behind Indra Dunis and Aaron Coyes while their beats bounced from polished surfaces. The narrow, high-ceilinged space was filled to its capacity but much of the audience was seated in roped-off sections which made the whole thing seem a little more orchestrated than the nonchalant approach Peaking Lights takes to making sounds. But in its own way, the Rubenstien Atrium provided an interesting context to that music, making a museum exhibit of the unorthodox, analogue practices of the artists. I even spotted Coyes Instagramming a snapshot of the space before the show. The more I see this band, the more in love with them I fall; there are very few acts making music this intoxicating. Watching Dunis lope around the stage, sometimes with percussive instruments, at other times making loops with a tiny keyboard, while Coyes hunches over synths and oscillators and cassette decks feels like a glimpse into their creative lifestyle – you get the sense that this is just what they do on weekday nights around the house as a married couple. Even if I never see “Amazing & Wonderful” live I’ll attend their shows whenever I have the chance.

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The next time I ventured out for an Unsound event was the following Sunday, which arrived after an exhausting weekend of working (and who knows what else), wrapped in a torrential downpour that almost cause me to skip the event altogether. The reason I didn’t was simple: Maria Minerva was playing the “closing party” for Unsound at Glasslands. I had a feeling that opportunities to see the Estonian hypnagogic pop chanteuse would be few and far between, and I have been moderately obsessed with her swoony, mysterious little forays into feminism, philosophy, and rough sex since Not Not Fun put out Cabaret Cixous last year. The label (and its offshoot, 100% Silk, which released a more recent EP entitled Sacred & Profane) are a great fit for Minerva’s music, which sounds like it’s swirling out from the bottom of a deep, dark well and then being transmitted into space. Her echoing vocals and relatively lo-fi set-up is part of that carefully constructed deconstruction, and her lyrics at once high-minded and rooted in mirroring the vapid pop lyrics of contemporary female icons like Britney Spears and Katy Perry.

Maria Minerva at Glasslands

On stage, it helps to keep this in mind, because if you didn’t know how highly educated she actually is, you’d think she learned English by listening to the same five pop songs. The lyrics are redundant, fixated pointedly on a singular subject or phrase and sung like mantras. She even borrows lyrics from aforementioned pop chanteuse Spears, expanding her lovesick repertoire to The Kinks’ “You Got Me” (or possibly referencing Salt-n-Pepa’s “Push It”), her voice despondent over orgasmic samples.

Like many electronic musicians who have not fully imagined a live performance before playing out, she stood awkwardly behind a table of electronics while a projector either illuminated or obscured her pretty, elfin features and bony frame. When she emerged from behind her equipment, it was to perch provocatively on a chair to stage right, or sometimes flail her svelte limbs. She seemed a bit nervous or uncomfortable with the material and the effects which make her voice so ghostly and layered when recorded didn’t translate as well in a live setting.

That being said, there’s still something fascinating about seeing her vulnerability on stage; I’m not entirely convinced that these supposed detractors weren’t a rehearsed part of the performance. So much of her music is about exploring a wilting image of helpless femininity, power stripped by emotion or desire. Minerva is exploring women’s supposed inability to think deeply when overtaken by repetitive thoughts regarding the external world and those who affect us emotionally or sexually, her music most concerned with the moment where our creative explorations become blocked by the expectations of others. Helene Cixous, the French philosopher, poet, and playwright for which Minerva’s album is named, explored the idea of emancipating women from male-centric language in her influential piece The Laughing Medusa, encouraging women instead to use their bodies as a new way of communicating. Punctuating Minerva’s reluctant postures were bursts of defiant confidence, though in the next moment she’d shy away from the crowd, shaking her head back and forth as if being reprimanded or secretly admonishing herself. Perhaps, if this struggle was not solely performative, those in the audience were witness to her public catharsis, a possibility that is certainly compelling. Minerva is a protege of Amanda Brown’s and it was difficult not to think of an LA Vampires performance I saw last November at Shea Stadium, where Brown shimmied unabashedly like a woman possessed, not just through her own set but through her 100% Silk’s labelmates’ sets as well. Perhaps with Brown as an ally Minerva can find a mode of expression as boisterous and provacative. It is certain that when she does, promoters such as those behind Unsound Festival will be there to embrace and nurture it, not stifle or block it.

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Baby’s First SXSW: Saturday

Holing up in a bungalow down the street from a yuppie mall had its decided advantages. There was a pool (though it was a bit chilly for swiming, we stuck our sore, swollen feet in more than a few evenings) a decent amount of peace & quiet, a sleepy looking orange cat who was feral but friendly enough to come say hello in the mornings, and proximity to Waterloo Records, where Boise dream pop darlings Youth Lagoon played to packed parking lot. The ephemeral tracks on debut album Year of Hibernation were recorded by 22-year-old Trevor Powers, who on stage hunches over a keyboard and wails earnestly into a microphone, while friends from the bands he’s played in his whole life back him up. Youth Lagoon have played a few NYC shows to much acclaim but I’d been hesitant to check them out, worried that all the bleary wonder of Hibernation would would dissipate, eroded by the boys’ precociousness, but I’m happy to say that it was in no way a detriment. While Hibernation is imbued with a huge but lonely sound, it doesn’t suffer at all in a live setting as I had feared it would. In fact, their faithful renditions and impassioned delivery were a great reminder of what makes Youth Lagoon’s slow-building, languid anthems so fresh and immediate. Maybe all my misgivings were indicative of my disdain for growing older (or feeling older, really), and let’s be real – in New York, I’d probably be surrounded by college undergrads still suffering from acne. Instead, I had the unusual pleasure of being encircled by a diverse audience that even included families with children, illustrating Youth Lagoon’s wide appeal and accessibility. It was a lovely afternoon treat, to be sure.

I headed downtown for the Village Voice showcase at Red Eyed Fly, a bar setup I was now becoming familiar with for its typical Austinness – divey hunting-lodge interior, dusty patio with scraggly trees, cheap Lone Star tallboys. Outside, L.A.-based babes Bleached were setting up. Last October they’d taken CMJ by storm but I hadn’t yet had the pleasure of taking in their fiery, in-your-face garage rock. They blazed through a rollicking set, slaying hearts and eardrums. Fronted by sisters Jessica and Jenn Calvin, Bleached fully satisfies all my riot grrl leanings of years past – they play fun, fast, and loose, in a nonchalantly sexy kind of way, snaring you with their trashed-up brand of eye candy but then proceeding to melt faces.
After a few songs I moseyed inside to see Pyschic Ills. The band’s 2011 release on Sacred Bones, Hazed Dream, sees the band’s culmination as blues-infused stoned-out psych droners. Before a backdrop of thick, raggedy velvet curtains, Brandon Davis’ sprawling keys, and the thudding bass of gothy-romantic Elizabeth Hart, backed the heavily glazed drawl and meandering guitarwork of Tres Warren, clad in grungy denim. By now I was convinced that everything is just louder in Texas. Psychic Ills’ normally mellow vibe was here amped up high enough to blast through concrete, though that wasn’t a huge loss. The highlight for me was sexy slow-burner “I’ll Follow You Through The Floor”, which got treated with a little extra jamming out. Between Bleached and Psychic Ills it was great to get a healthy dose of rock-n-roll from some bands with a more traditional set-up, since it seemed that this year’s acts were largely favoring tables of electronics to actual instruments.
Class Actress also played the showcase, and falls squarely into the former category. While they did have a drummer instead of a machine that played drum sounds, the line-up still hinges on the guy-with-gadgets/charismatic-girl-with-mic dynamic. When I’d first seen them it was just after their inception, opening for Yeasayer. In that time I would say that though their sound has not diverged much from their initial vision they’ve certainly come into their own. Elizabeth Harper’s carefully honed stage persona is nothing short of rock star – she wore mirrored shades the whole time, flitting across the stage, shimmying before the swooning audience as if it were one of her first SXSW performances rather than, by her count, the ninth in five days. She performs as if born to do so; in watching Harper’s flirtatious stage moves you could just as well be watching her do a photo shoot in a fashion magazine. This is a quality she’s always possessed, but she’s grown even more bold in her role not just as singer but as entertainer, never content to be relegated to a position behind the keyboard she mostly ignored throughout the set. The glamour-infused party jams from 2011’s Rapprocher were incredibly well-received by the crowd; it was hard to tell if these folks had just happened onto the scene and become instant converts or if they were long-term fans seeking out the chance to dance along with their idols.
Because Saturday was not just the final day of SXSW but also St. Patrick’s Day, the streets were flooded with a hoard of idiots dressed in green clothing, so I’d had enough of that scene for a while. Besides, Sun Araw and Cloudland Canyon were playing a so-unofficial-it’s-practically-secret gig with some electronic drone and psych bands at the Monofonus Press compound, a crust-punk utopia four miles outside the downtown area in a remote sector of far East Austin. In a maze of salvaged vintage trailers and corrugated tin sculpture was situated a grassy stage. The trees were decorated with blown glass ornaments and rusting basketball hoops. There was an inexplicable pit of abandoned bowling balls, next to which some middle-aged hippies had spread a comfy patchwork blanket on which to mind their unwashed children. Colorful DIY merch was spread on those over-sized spools, as were a pile of free zines, one of which was entitled Cool Magic Tricks for Teens (I snapped that one up immediately). Say what you will about a scene such as this, but after unwittingly absorbing the barrage of marketing campaigns being hurled at me by every corporation with a stake in SXSW, it was nice to be in a space free of advertisements. Not to mention, I got to enjoy the sedated set offered by Cloudland Canyon, whose droning, drowned psych rock I’ve loved since the release of their stunning Requiems Der Natur, a compilation of the Krautrock-influenced vibes they’d explored in the early part of the decade. It had been my plan to arrive in time to catch Sun Araw’s set, but I’d somehow confused the set-times and so only caught the last brilliant moments of a few of their submerged, tropicalia-laced jams.
Cloudland Canyon’s furious knob-twisting resulted in a woozy wave of noise most informed by the sounds on their 2010 release Fin Eaves. The crunchy, skittering synth effects and dense, distorted guitar melodies melded thickly in the balmy air, cascading through the leafy heights of attendant elms. Up in the farthest reaches, Kip Uhlhorn’s insistent moan arced through these saturated compositions, acting more as instrumental component than sonic focus. Uhlhorn’s wife, Kelly, was welcome addition to the band after the departure of longtime collaborator Simon Wojan, her stoic electronic manipulations melding everything together in a terrific wave of lush squall. I was so blissed on their performance I didn’t even whip out my iPhone to snap pics or capture video, as I am often wont to do; the kaleidoscopic magic of the Monofonus compound, bathed in the bubbling, staticky lull provided by Cloudland Canyon, hardly seemed the place for such obtrusive, new-fangled machinations.
A friend of mine I’d not seen in ages suggested we meet at House of Commons, a DIY showspace in a huge house on the University of Texas campus, so I eventually peeled myself from my grassy slumber and headed Northwest. The campus area is pretty revolting even with all the pledges out of town for Spring Break, although not unlike my own experience of the sprawling OSU campus in Columbus. Added to my deja vu and general disgust, the fact that this friend of mine was a no show made me want to get the hell out of there, but I figured I might as well grab some food that wasn’t made in a truck (also a big mistake; I had the most desultory bahn mi I’ve ever eaten)so I started wandering around. I was hearing music coming from somewhere, and it didn’t take so long to figure out it was coming from the back of an Urban Outfitters and the performer was none other my girl Grimes. It was obviously packed to capacity so I grabbed a chair from a nearby patio and craned my neck over the fence with a few others who had been denied at the door. She seemed to have slept in the clothes I’d seen her in last night and was still suffering from vocal strain but as I now KNOW I’ve mentioned before I’m in love with Claire Boucher, so it didn’t matter.
Afterwards, I did poke around HoC a bit, as Cleveland’s HotChaCha was playing. This is a band I’ve already seen far more times necessary, due to the fact that they’re from Ohio and we have some mutual friends. By the time and Jovanna Batkovic and Co. had started bringing their YeahYeahYeahs-esque brand of dance punk around Columbus I was kind of over that scene, but had still admired the talented all-girl line-up for their bravado as well as their skilled playing. Unfortunately, like most things coming out of Cleveland, HotChaCha has deteriorated from their former gloried state as I remember it from my youth. In this somewhat pitiful and desperate incarnation of the band, Jovanna dramatically burned herself with cigarettes and her friend took over the mic at one point to perform an impromptu rap about hipsters. Weird times are still good times, but I’d had enough of both, so it was back to civilization for me.

I decided to do a second round Cheer Up Charlie’s, where Javelin and Teengirl Fantasy were on the bill. To start, I’m not sure what Javelin were doing at SXSW this year; the showcase they’d played two years ago to the day in the exact same location made a lot more sense as that’s when Javelin was really on the rise, making a name for themselves as partytime sound collagists who blend every style from disco to R&B to funk to pop. But they’ve since established quite a reputation for themselves and as far as I know don’t have a new release coming out anytime soon. That’s not to say their presence wasn’t much enjoyed; their live shows are infused with the kind of energy usually seen in daycares where the charges are provided with espresso shots. Cousins George Langford and Tom van Buskirk know how to throw a party, and it’s nice to see them branching out and expanding their talents as musicians (Tom had a guitar on stage, which he told the crowd he was learning to play) while staying true to their DIY junk-shop pop ethos. Shortly into the set, one of the speakers blew, but a quick change-up gave the dudes new life and new excuses to bring the noise. All the improvisational elements of Javelin’s live shows were here as well, from made-up-on-spot verses to a cover of “Sabotage” that Nite Jewel tweeted was the “whitest” thing she’s ever heard, possibly because she forgot that the Beastie Boys, too, are white.

Following up such an animated performance with the same gusto was no small challenge. Oberlin grads Logan Takahashi and Nick Weiss are beatsmiths of the finest order, and though their delivery of tracks from 2010’s 7am was a bit more scaled back it still had the crowd dancing. Like a bottle of cheapish champagne chilled to just the right temperature, TGF popped off tracks like “Cheaters” and “Portofino” with at synths and samples at once glistening and fuzzy. The highlight of the set featured an appearance from vocalist Kilela Mizankristos who brought some serious soul to TGF’s disco pop flourishes.

After the set, I headed to Longbranch Inn to check out Impose Magazine’s final showcase. The venue was running behind schedule, so I walked in on the last of Xander Harris’s droney electronic set. He was followed by Sapphire Slows, a Tokyo-based electronic composer who effectively hides behind a tiny set-up of gadgets and keyboards and shifts around listlessly while reproducing her submerged but polished beats by pushing a bevy of buttons. Layering laconic vocals over her sultry compositions proved an effective means of winning over the audience; I heard one guy repeatedly gushing over how stoked he was to see a female truly deliver on an electronic performance (apparently he didn’t get a chance to see Grimes?). While Sapphire Slows’ rhythms are moody and honed to perfection, there wasn’t much to see in terms of her delivery. She remained pretty stiff, her stare a bit blank, as if trying to remember which knob to twist. It didn’t help that I was surrounded by the tallest audience ever, including a dude well over 6’5” in a Kevin-Arnold style Jets jacket that Paul and Winnie could have also climbed into to camp out in. Every time I thought I’d secured a spot with some decent visibility, some overgrown Austinite would lurch in front of me. I was finally jostled into a corner between a jukebox and the edge of the stage where I could perch while Tearist delivered the most mind-blowing performance I saw all week.

Not knowing much about L.A. band Tearist prior to SXSW, my only expectations were based on a glowing review of a set a friend had caught earlier in the week. Vocalist/feral child Yasmine Kittles stood on stage, tiny in an oversized camouflaged hunting parka with her brown tresses done up in a huge top knot. She carried a large, rusting table fan onto the stage and set it to blowing, tugging her hair down around her face and removing the jacket to reveal a tiny frame clad in black lacy top, leather shorts, and ripped tights. The fan whipped her wildly around wide black eyes lined with black mascara. She howled over a sludgy backdrop of insistent beats and grinding synths produced by her cohort, William Strangeland-Menchaca, her voice deep and resonant. She writhed across the stage as if performing some ritual, lifting her arms up and sweeping them to the floor in one gracious motion. At one moment she was kneeling, at another attempting to climb the Impose-bannered curtains. Throughout the set, Kittles maintained an intensity in her faraway gaze as if the seething masses worshipping her at the foot of the stage were no present, but was also acutely aware of her surroundings, like a caged animal searching for an escape route. The visceral, almost autistic urgency in Kittles’ performance is consistently anchored by the stoic presence of Strangeland-Menchaca, whose rhythms sizzle and pop. They are punctuated by Kittles’ occasional swings at hammered metal box she holds in one hand and attacks with a metallic receiver she holds in the other, the sound coming out somewhere between a clashing clap and electronic thunderbolt. I obviously see a lot of live music, and I’ve seen performances of this nature more than a few times, but there’s simply something about Tearist that is specifically mesmerizing, exciting, and electrifying. With Kittles’ unabashed lack of self control, you’re left to wonder what she’ll do next; its as though she’s suffering some intense rite of passage and every shred of intensity is both turned inward and focused on deliverance outward, like lava flowing from an erupting volcano.

Peaking Lights offered a mellowed change of pace, providing the perfect comedown. While 2009’s Imaginary Falcons was a sublime piece of psych drone, it was last year’s widely acclaimed 936 that broke the band to larger audiences. Hailing from Wisconsin, married couple Indra Dunis and Aaron Coyes meld together swirling, heady notes with dubby 8-tracked beats, forming a narcotic poetry. Looking ever part the opium-den goddess, Indra swayed back and forth, alternately shaking maracas, tickling the keys of a tiny vintage piano, and crooning into her mic, clothed in yellow silks depicting peacocks. Coyes was a more unassuming entity in his jean jacket, manning drum machines and samples with an occasional shake or nod of his head. The set was shortened by the closing of the bar, the show having run way past its 2am end time. While doped-up devotional “Amazing and Wonderful” was sadly missing, the set was an interesting look into what we can expect from upcoming release “Lucifer”, likely to be a bit more playful and perhaps even disco inspired, as their most recent mixtape indicates.
Though Longbranch had let the band keep playing beyond last call, once the last beats faded the lights came up and the bartender shouted, “That’s it, folks… South by Southwest is over, thank fucking God!” I’m guessing it gets pretty grating on locals to have thousands of hard-drinking, heavy-partying music fans descend on your otherwise quiet, quirky little patch of dirt, even if they are stimulating your local economy and putting you on the map in the most innovative tech, music and film circles.

I had to go meet up with my posse, who were at that time witnessing the now infamous Vice party in which Trash Talk prepped their wily fans to turn A$AP Rocky’s set into an all-out brawl. I waited patiently while a throng of disbelieving revelers trudged out of the venue and into the dust, likely as exhausted from all the insanity as I was. Nothing lasts forever, as they say, and though I’d missed my opportunity to see more than a handful of acts I’d really been looking forward to catching, I was walking away having seen over thirty bands in the space of four days. My phone had no remaining memory for photos or videos. I’d earned eight badges in fourSquare. Including transportation and lodging, I’d spent less that $400 bucks. And I’d be back to do it all again next year, no doubt.