Sometimes real life intervenes and BYT gets put on the back burner. When this happens we threaten to withhold paychecks to our contributors as well as publicly humiliate them on the site. But we like Rick a lot. So we let him get away with it. This time… -ed.
Photos by Bill Jenne
I was fortunate to attend the Chessie/Atlas Sound/Stereolab show at 9:30 Club last week. It was my first time seeing all three bands. Here are my “snap shot” impressions:
Chessie: Phenomenal. This experimentally tinged, electronic/acoustic band, led by Lorelei bassist Stephen Gardner and audio engineer guru Ben Bailes, was the perfect musical accompaniment to the drizzly weather outside. The band operates from a bold conceptual framework: to create sound that conjures the emotions related to the railway environment. To that end, Chessie employs a wide range of different sound-generating mechanisms, from drum loops and machine-sound samples, to ethereal guitar, organic drums and even space itself.
The band’s gorgeous, spiralling guitar arpeggios gave me goose pimples. I’m ashamed to admit that this is a band I’m not more familiar with. I had heard they were good, but had no idea they were *this good*. In fact, it might be a tough call for me to say which band I enjoy more, Chessie or Lorelei. Lucky for me (and all of you), we don’t have to choose between one or the other.
Like Lorelei, Chessie is a band that revels in introspective atmospherics. The key difference between the two is that Lorelei is more song-based; Lorelei’s forays into the experimental tend to be in the form of unusual song arrangements and the unpredictable time-signatures of skin-beater extraordinaire Davis White. Both bands are worth your time and attention, but if you only focus on Lorelei, you are missing out on some truly beautiful and visually evocative sounds. I made sure to pick up two Chessie cds at the show before I left. Woo-hoo!
Atlas Sound: I really dig Atlas Sound’s debut album “Let the Blind Lead Those Who Can See But Cannot Feel” and was curious to see how those recordings would translate to a live setting. I knew going into the show that the band was a side-project of Deerhunter vocalist Bradford Cox; I assumed he would be traveling with some other players as he did when the group played the Black Cat backstage earlier this year. However, this was not the case. The Atlas Sound live show was just Cox with a laptop and a bunch of electronic do-hickeys on stage, a guitar and a keyboard. This isn’t necessarily a criticism though.
I did however find it a bit difficult to determine which sounds were being created right there on the spot and which ones were the result of a mouse click. Regardless, I lost myself in the abstract wall of sound that submerged the 9:30 Club during the Atlas Sound set. The couple standing in front of me clearly didn’t get it though—I caught a few “What the hell?” back and forth glances between them. Yup, bands as left-field as Atlas Sound don’t play the 9:30 Club all that often. There was definitely a part of me that enjoyed the simple fact that a near capacity crowd was getting exposed to Bradford’s demented avant-tinkerings.
The only slight issue I had during Atlas Sound was an annoying problem with the club’s giant speaker above the right part of the stage, which cut off for an uncomfortable amount of time before going back on, and then cutting back off again. What happened? Did somebody accidentally feed Gizmo after midnight and leave him inside the 9:30 Club? Seriously, I was in the throes of musical avant-merriment and then—yank! Coitus interruptus? At 9:30? I kind of expected more, you know…
Stereolab: With such a huge body of work, Stereolab’s music can be an intimidating nut to crack for newcomers. I’ve been following the band for years and have yet to find the time to familiarize myself with all their studio albums and EPs (but my sense is I probably don’t need to). My take on the band: From what I’ve heard, I don’t think any one particular era is more consistent than another; even their earlier, “weirder” and more guitar-friendly phase had moments of pure paint-drying dullness to go hand in hand with flourishes of pure genius.
Predictably, the band played a healthy number of tracks from its latest long-player “Chemical Chords.” That album’s peppy opener, “Neon Beanbag,” was well received by the crowd when it was played early on in the set, but it was the more energetic and better-known numbers that drew the biggest applause, such as “Ping Pong,” “French Disko,” and “John Cage Bubblegum.”
I couldn’t help but feel as though the band’s live show served as a mirror reflection of their recorded output, with certain songs clearly more engaging than others. I was wondering why some of their songs failed to connect with me (and judging by the lighter, more rote applause, the audience overall) and I’ve come to the following conclusion: It’s not that the weaker Stereolab songs are bad per se; it’s just that it’s hard to see them as anything more than the kind of ephemeral musical wallpaper one is often subjected to at coffee shops and Ikeas nationwide—you know, the kind of tunes that hardly qualify as offensive, but are also too passive to be interesting. The fact that these numbers were being played by a band that didn’t seem to be all that into what they were doing kinda underscored the point.
Stereolab have so many phenomenal songs over their nearly 20 year career. Based on this show however, a ‘Lab newcomer would only get a few glimpses into the high-quality songwriting powers the group (or should I say, groop) can sometimes tap into.
I think I was one of that couple in front of the author…anyway. The show was seriously lackluster by Stereolab’s standards, I have seen them twice before (including their last concert at 9:30 in 2006) and they are capable of much better. One thing that surprised me was the lack of a lot of the classic singles they usually play. It was pretty far along in their tour I think, maybe they were tired. Still my girlfriend is new to the band and liked it, so maybe it wasn’t that bad.
October 8, 2008 at 10:23 pm