winner will be announced/contacted shortly

The brother and sister duo of Eleanor and Matthew Friedberger officially came together as the experimental Indie-pop project, Fiery Furnaces back in 2000.  Since then, they have consistently proven themselves to be one of the most adventurous and prolific groups in contemporary music.  The duo is credited with 9 releases throughout their shifts between 3 of the most respected independent record labels in the business (Rough Trade, Fat Possum, & Thrill Jockey).  With Eleanor taking on the majority of the vocal duties (both live and in studio) and Matthew handling most of the instrumentation, the brother and sister team has created everything from concept albums to incredibly inventive re-workings/re-editings of previous material, a “silent album” and even their “Democ-Rock” series, which attempts to place the fate of the music -both in content and approach- into the hands of their fans/audience.  It’s not rare to find Eleanor singing pop-like melodies over a mutated fabric of bubbling and squawking sonic confusion ala-Captain Beefheart, with glimpses of Brazillian psych legends Os Mutantes, shambolic free-jazz drum assaults, or synthed-out bleeps and blown-out bass lines forcing their way up through the film of buzzing Marquee Moon-esque guitar work.  It’s often been difficult to describe their sound for many, but the word “difficult” itself has been used on more than one occasion.  Their live performances had a tendency for becoming even more “experimental”, blending songs together or simply fragmenting and reconstructing them into new creations altogether.

Matthew dropped two simultaneous solo records in 2006, but Eleanor didn’t bother to take that same plunge into the realm of solo artist until 2011‘s 10-song effort, Last Summer.  Overall, Last Summer was received with incredibly positive reviews, even landing on multiple best of the year lists.  With her vocal cadence often coming through like a cross between Jonie Mitchell and an On Golden Pond-era Katherine Hepburn injected into the bone of verse-chorus-verse structure, it would be almost understandable for one to attempt to classify the release as a straight ahead indie-pop effort, but the stark shifts in tone, subtly off-kilter rhythms, and varied influences overlap in such manners that they often become something almost undefinable.  It’s something that is decidedly and uniquely Friedberger.

Guitar in hand, Eleanor is currently touring in support of Last Summer and our friends at the legendary Seattle venue, The Crocodile have offered us a pair of tickets to kick down to one of youz guyz, so as you can go to and enjoy the show real nice like.

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THE CONTEST / GIVEAWAY:

*One winner will receive a a pair of tickets to see Eleanor Friedberger perform live @ The Crocodile in Seattle on Thursday February 9, 2012

HOW TO ENTER:

This contest will revolve around the subject matter in Eleanor’s latest video for her song “HEAVEN”

#1)

The late great Curtis Mayfield once wrote a song titled, “(Don’t Worry) If There’s Hell Below, We’re All Going to Go” and he was right.  It’s getting to the point where you can’t even grift your own elderly relatives into purchasing faulty life-support equipment or organize an unsanctioned hobo thunderdome without being cursed with eternal damnation.

In Eleanor‘s video for “Heaven” (above) the songstress has committed a number of different acts that are considered unsavory enough to zap her ass straight to hell.  The concepts of “Right” and “Wrong” may be subjective, but your task is pretty straightforward: Tell us a pet-peeve that you have that, although it isn’t necessarily illegal or considered to be a “sin”, is something that you feel is cause for damnation.

Examples:

*People who feel that they are justified in leaving their running cars in a place that blocks through access on my street, just because they turn on their hazard lights, deserve to get their asses zapped straight to hell.

*Folks that dangerously cut through traffic with those little child carriers swinging from the back of their bikes deserved to have their asses zapped straight to hell

[note: they don't have to be traffic related]

#2)

Post your answer in the comment section below.

#3)

There is no part 3.  That’s all there is to the contest.  It’s pretty easy… but you should probably read the fine print.

The Fine Print:

All entries must be received by Tuesday February 7th at 11:59 pm to be eligible.

You can enter as many times as you want, but use a valid email so that we can contact you.
If you sign in w/Facebook, make sure your account excepts messages.
Winner will be chosen arbitrarily, based on our personal “favorite”, so try to be interesting.
If we are unable to contact the winner in a reasonable amount of time, a new winner will be chosen.

[If you have any intentions to post comments asking us to pick you, or asking when the winner will be announced... how about, just don't do it?  It's pretty fucking obnoxious and it won't help your chances.]

Prior to the Awesome Show, Tim and Eric starred-in/created Tom Goes to the Mayor, another Adult Swim program that, unlike it’s follow-up, was primarily animated and much more story-based.  The limited animation style of TGTTM was created from highly expressive (both facially and bodily) still images -processed through photo-shop to resemble photocopies and making for incredibly jumpy transitional movements for the characters- to tell the stories.  The program, which evolved from a web series, had a very specific aesthetic of it’s own, while including random live action clips interspersed throughout it.  When the Awesome Show was created, it adopted some of those same live action characters (ie. married news team, Jan and Wayne Skylar).  It also brought with it some of the many co-stars/cameos that Heidecker and Wareheim had managed to work with on Tom Goes to the Mayor (Patton Oswalt, Zach Galifianakis, Jeff Goldblum, etc.).  With the shift into the more fragmented approach of the Awesome Show, an altogether new, yet equally distinct, aesthetic was created that came to define the duo.  Eschewing the static imagery and stiff facsimile look of the two-tone TOM for schizophrenic blips and the diced-up scattered imagery of their new program, the live action felt decidedly more “animated” and, for lack of a better word, psychedelic.  It was like laying half-chloroformed in a bin of mixed candy’s while a wall of televisions flipped through clips of Max Headroom, QVC, white noise, Univision, and Sid and Mary Krofft outtakes.  While TGTTM was like a pill high (or, low, rather), The Awesome Show was like floating out of an LSD or Molly trip, while spiking your high back up with OJ, wasabi, and a cocktail of  the shit that gets you crunk, but wasn’t necessarily created for that intended purpose (solvents, dramamine, nitrous, Robitussin).  The strychnine was dirty.  The cinematography often felt like a real life John Kricfalusi cartoon. This was a style that followed Wareheim into directorial work in videos for the likes of MGMT, The Bird and the Bee, Major Lazer, and Depeche Mode, as well as commercials for Old Spice.  They’ve done live tours and even some short films for HBO‘s Funny Or Die presents, but this week the comedy duo is attempting to translate their trademark tomfoolery onto the big screen (or small screen, depending) with a handful of somewhat unorthodox promotional methods.

THE FILM

Co-presented by Funny Or Die, Tim & Eric’s Billion Dollar Movie revolves around the concept that the stars were given one-billion dollars to make a film, but pretty much blow it all immediately and are then expected to repay what they’ve fizzled away.  From there, hijinks and comedy ensue.  Many Awesome Show pals and semi-regulars such as John C. Reilly, Zach Galifianakis, Jeff Goldblum, Will Forte, and Will Ferrell make appearances, along with the folks who’ve starred in memorable sketches/segments and earned most of their own recognizability through the Adult Swim program (James Quall, David Liebe Hart, and Palmer Scott).  Perhaps the most intriguing twists come with their consistent casting of historically more “stoic” or “serious” personalities like Robert Loggia (Scarface, Big), William Atherton (Ghostbusters, Die Hard), Costas Mandylor (Picket Fences, Mobsters), Ray Wise (Twin Peaks, 24), and even business tycoon/executive producer, Marc Cuban (Dallas Mavericks, Lionsgate ent., etc.).  There is even narration provided by Michael Gross of Family Ties fame.  Simply based on nothing other than the trailer alone, the film is unmistakably a Tim & Eric production, but, as stated before, it is intended to follow a somewhat cohesive storyline and veer away from their typically and disorientingly warped pacing, which is far less likely to work as effectively in a longer format.

THE PLEDGE

Tim and Eric have stated that, after 5 seasons in as many years, the Awesome Show is effectively over in it’s current form.  Just like their previous jump from Tom Goes to the Mayor, the guys are moving on to new projects with the hopes that they will be received as successfully as the one that they’re moving on from.  To ensure that help to insure that people support their newest venture, Heidecker and Wareheim have created a form that anyone can print out and sign, pledging that they will make the effort to go out and watch Tim & Eric’s Billion Dollar Movie, among other things.

In a relatively short period of time, an impressive number of celebrities  (as well as us lesser, common-folk) have videotaped themselves signing the document.  Here are a few of the more notable uploads…

Elijah Wood

James Murphy

Aziz Ansari

Paul Rudd

Weird Al

More videos on the official BDMPLEDGE Youtube Page HERE.

SIGN THE PLEDGE!

Rango’ed

Over the last week or so, Heidecker and Wareheim premiered their decidedly “raunchy” Billion Dollar Movie at -of all places- The Sundance Film Festival in Utah.  Throughout the frenzy of publicity that occurs at the world famous “indie” film fest, the duo participated in more than a handful of interviews.  Most of the footage simply shows the guys toying with interviewers and/or pushing the idea of a conspiracy that their film was actually being re-edited by studio heads to incorporate outtakes from the animated Johnny Depp lizard/Western vehicle Rango and pleading for the fans to help petition against Sundance, begging the festival to hear their pleas and show the “original” pure and “un-Rango’ed” version.

Instead of promoting their film in the typical manner and allowing the interview to progress in the direction that the interview is likely hoping and prepared for(discussing the film, etc), this following interaction with In The Can demonstrates Tim and Eric redirecting the tone and subject in their own unique and expertly perfected manner.

[If you're short on time, but still into really awkward shit, jump ahead to view the 6:47 - 7:25 mark]

As their wolf cries about Rango continued, it was great to see people like Alia Shawkat (Arrested Development) jump in to perpetuate the absurdity.

Here’s a nicely polished and edited little video that shows a condensed 360 version of the entire Rango’ing saga.

THE RELEASE (Sundance, Theaters, On-Demand, & Youtube)

Not all of the press that Tim and Eric participated in at Sundance was focused on or redirected towards the propaganda about Rango.  In fact, some of the interviews actually showcase footage where the filmmakers are the most “out-of-character” than we’ve probably ever seen them.  One such interview with The Hollywood Reporter stays pretty much on topic throughout it’s majority, but they do make tongue in cheek references about people walking out of films.  For those of you who bother to watch until after the credits of the last “Rango Saga” video (@2:36 mark) you will see footage of Eric Wareheim claiming that he and his partner “killed Sundance” and that the movie was “a total hit“.  Whether that’s an accurate account of the film’s reception or not is subjective, but what we do know is that plenty of people got up ans simply walked out in the middle of the screenings.  [To be fair, it's not the only controversial movie that drove uncomfortable patrons from the theaters mid-screening; Rick Alverson's, The Comedian, a drama about aging uncouth hipster's -also starring Heidecker and featuring Wareheim, along with James Murphy of LCD Soundsytem and DFA Records- also proved to be incredibly polarizing.]

In an even more frank and straightforward interview with /FILM, they discuss how they didn’t bother to “cater” their work towards the Sundance “community” at all and make sure to stress that the film was intentionally created to be viewed on the big screen, implying that witnessing the full and varied audience interaction is part of the overall experience.  In that same interview, they further explain that their compromise with finding alternate methods of release outside of theaters came from an acknowledgement that, with the films limited theater release, many fans might be unable to view the film otherwise.  In fact, their Video On Demand release, which began yesterday (January 27th), arrives more than a full month before the March 2nd theatrical debut for the public.

Taking further advantage of what current technology has to offer, Tim and Eric have also made the film available for advanced screening on Youtube.  You may have noticed, through accidental clicks or otherwise, that Youtube has added the option to rent feature length films on the site. No?  Yes?  Well, they have and the Billion Dollar Movie is one such movie that is currently available.  This evens the playing field further, for those who do not have access to On demand through their televisions.  Here… I’ll let the creators sell you the idea themselves.

If you still haven’t caught on yet, you’re being bamboozled with the stalling youtube video above; it’s all chicanery and Hollywood magic.  It’s a parody y’all… shenanigans.  But seriously folks… if you want to rent it on youtube, you can do so through HERE.

To visit the official Tim and Eric’s Billion Dollar Movie website, CLICK HERE.

If you’ve made it through this entire post (videos included), great job!

Electronic music is not my genre of expertise, so it came as a surprise to me when I heard AO’s soothing and ambient tones on his solo release.  I had the good fortune of then, seeing him live at the Dropping Gems Showcase at Decibel Festival, where he was joined by friend and frequent collaborator, Zuri Biringer, whose lilting guitar riffs added a grounded sense of nature, invoking images of sky and water.  It’s impossible to listen to the Seattle native’s sound without being drawn to the beats.  However, while they ultimately drive the music forward, they aren’t the primary focus of the songs, which create a vivid mood through crooning vocals, guitar, and keyboard.  In combination with some incredible imagery that accompanied the performance, the set was nearly transcendent.

Not long after his show that night, I was able to sit down with Alex to discuss his development as a DJ and find out where he draws his inspiration from.  His ambient sound was a divergence from the sounds that I had heard from him previously and I had many questions.  Eloquently and in fascinating detail, he was able to give me answers to questions that I didn’t even know that I had.  To an electronic media newbie, like myself, I found him to be incredibly informative and insightful; even providing hints on where to start my own exploration of the vast genre.  In the end, he was even so helpful as to give a demonstration of how he creates his unique style.

The following is the transcript from that conversation.

PARVANEH: I guess my basic question would be, when did you get interested in electronic music and where did you see yourself going when you started?

DJAO: So, I don’t really know where to begin really.  I guess the first time that I ever heard an electronic music song that I thought, “Oh shit this is really incredible,” I heard- yeah, I guess it’s like the first track from the Beastie Boys album, Hello Nasty.  Yeah I heard it in like sixth grade.  We were sitting on a bus.  We were on a school trip and they had the CD and that was when that album came out, and I remember hating on it quite a bit.  -I’m sorry, I’m really OCD, I just need to make sure this is recording right.

[Checks on the recording]

Anyway so sixth grade on the bus?

So, sixth grade on the bus.  I remember I saw- I don’t know, it’s a long story, but I saw the Beastie Boys album cover and I was like, “I bet that sucks!”  and I was on this bus ride, and a friend of mine lent it to me.  I thought that them rapping was pretty cool, but the beat… everything about it was just so crazy to me.  It was like, “Wow, this is one of the hardest pieces of music I’ve ever heard”.  Up until then, I was just listening to 90s alternative.  I was really into Rage Against the Machine and stuff like that.  Then, through the Beastie Boys…  Their DJ is one of the best scratch DJs, his name is Mixmaster Mike and is one of the craziest musicians who uses a turntable, basically.  He’s really out there and really experimental and the crew that he’s from is really experimental.  They’ve done a lot of work.  They’ve released albums around turntables, using them to produce sound that I don’t think anyone’s really matched…  The whole turntable thing really died out.  That’s the way I really came to it, ’cause I really started DJing sophomore year of high school.  I wasn’t even DJing for people.  I was just, literally, in my room with the turntables just scratching for like ,two years probably…  Just scratching, listening to really, really weird beats made by other DJs and scratching with no purpose and no plan whatsoever.

Then I started DJing high school parties and dances and stuff, but I was still basically listening to all hip hop.  So, then I started DJing out.  Playing shows and stuff, just doing dances for friends at their houses and fundraisers.  You know, high schools.  Then, I went to college and I was still pretty much just listening to hip hop all the time and DJing and all that, and my style of DJing just started to get weirder -like the chopped and screwed stuff that I do now when I DJ, as opposed to my live show- started freshman and sophomore year.  I mean, it started in High School, but that’s when it really started to flourish.

And then, it was my junior year, when I studied abroad in London, where I really got exposed to-  Well, I was kind of eclectic, but when I moved to a different city where no one listened to hip hop, or most of my friends didn’t listen to hip hop, I suddenly learned about just so many different kinds of music and started to go out and see it live, which had a lot to do with me starting to catch on.  Especially when, around that time, that was…  that was 2007-2008…  That wasn’t when dubstep first started, but it was right when it was blowing up in-  Before it had blown up in America, but when it was becoming really developed and popular and a lot of people were starting to accept it as cutting edge and interesting.  And a lot of my favorite artists are dubstep artist who are from that era and who I saw live.  Like Benga,who I saw live before his album came out.  I only knew him through the internet.  I didn’t come to London knowing anything and, sitting in my room in London on the internet and realizing that all these super cutting edge dudes, who are so interesting and fascinating to me, are all in the city I was in, I was like, “Oh my god, I have to go to some of these shows”.  I remember, when I went to see Benga -I couldn’t find anybody to go with me- and, I remember I was just lying in bed that night and I was like, “Well, what am I gonna do tonight?  Am I just going to smoke and pass out, or am I going to go to this show by myself?“  And I went and, first of all, I met him and then, that is where I met my British girlfriend, totally randomly.

So it worked out well.

Turned out to be a good choice.  But I came back and my senior year just completely changed the music I DJed.  I started listening to electro, started listening to way more dubstep, and started listening to futurebeat.  Which is I guess is where you’d put me now, sort of.  But there’s a lot of words for it, like IDM.

What would that stand for?

That stands for “Intelligent Dance Music.”  It’s for like, experimental 90 beats per minute roughly.  It’s a pretty nebulous term.  It has a lot of connotations with music that came out in the mid-late 90s, or early 2000s.

I know when I saw you at the Baltic Room last fall, it definitely sounded like-  I mean, I’m sure it also had to do with the theme of the night, but it sounded much more dubstep-style.  A lot of heavy beats, but definitely pretty scratchy, do you feel like you were influenced by glitch at all, either?

You know, I think I was more influenced more by J Dilla than I was by any hard IDM or hard glitch, and I have friends who are really into glitch, like Calvin from Ghost Feet…  We did a Portland show recently and he drove me down from Olympia and he said, “You should check out this hard minimum glitch that I got from France.”  He said, “This stuff is so computer error,” and I was like, I like this stuff, but I don’t.  I don’t seek it out.  It definitely influences my music but it’s not like…

Not one of your main influences…

Not one of my main influences.  I think mainly it influences me through other artists that inspire me.  But that particular show was a DJ set, right?

Yeah

So yeah, I remember that set, that was really fun.  That was a lot of hip hop and chillwave and future beat and there was definitely some really crazy dubstep in there too.

*laughing* Yeah.

Yeah, the guy who booked me, Ill Cosby, is a future bass DJ and so, I pulled out more of my upper tempo- you know, strange, really mindblowingly arranged dance tunes for that one, more than I normally do.

I think…  I want to go back to that, too, but for your current stuff -like your Ep and the stuff you played at Decibel Festival- is much more low key, kind of with Zuri playing guitar and the singing aspect of it…  I’d been keeping up with your pieces coming out on the Dropping Gems compilations and, when your EP came out, I thought, “Wow, where did this come from?“  It sounded like a completely different style.  Was this something you were building up to, or was it something you didn’t really have the opportunity to do with the Dropping Gems Collective, or….?

Well all of that music is definitely like Dropping Gems music-

Really?

Yeah, because I make a lot of different kinds of music, but I have my more up-tempo stuff coming out on Car Crash Set in the middle of November, and I also have just straight dance music, like just regular dance music…  I guess it’s not regular, but to me it is, I just sit down and I think, “I’m gonna make a Baltimore club tune” and it just comes out however it comes out.  But, like the first song on the EP, “Underbrush,” when I sat down to make that, I thought, “I’m gonna make a dubstep tune” and that’s what came out…  So, I don’t always know. *laughter*  But, in my head, I classify it one way, but people…  But, that material is mostly over a year old.  Like “Green Lake” was a song I made right when I got a computer.  Like, I was in Seattle a while without a computer.

I guess I didn’t finish explaining…  When I graduated from college, I started working at a production company and started using the studio there and that’s how I actually started making beats.  I mean, I made beats in high school in the digital media lab on GarageBand and so, then using Logic -which is the professional version of GarageBand- which was at the studio I was working at, was not difficult.  And I still have tons of material from that time that hasn’t been released and I don’t know if it will ever be released and what I’ll do with it.  It doesn’t really matter, but all that stuff is really different.  But, I moved back to Seattle and, a couple months later, I got a computer; it was that summer.  Summer of 2010.  So, a little over a year ago.

So do you feel like you identify with some of the kinds of music that you’ve put out any more than others?  Like, do you feel like the stuff that came out on your EP was maybe stuff that expressed more of an individual style, or…?

Well, it’s hard to say with that, specifically.  I mean, all of that is really, really personal stuff, but, like I said, it’s pretty much a good record of the last year.  “Green Lake,” I made it last summer.  I made “Taigamoss”…  I made it last fall or winter.  “Underbrush” I’ve literally been working on for a year, at least.  “Moon Sun Ravine” just started as a beat with those voices, and that shit is really old too.  “Through The Field” is relatively recent, but couldn’t be any newer than the Spring.  The only thing that really I made this summer would be the second half of “Moon Sun Ravine” with Zuri playing the guitar, which I just made while I was living on Capitol Hill and I just called Zuri and said, “Man can you come over and play?  Bring your guitar I need to finish this goddamn EP.”

So how did the partnership…?

Yeah, the collaboration, the collaborative partnership-

…the collaboration with Zuri come about?

We’ve just been friends for a long time- Man, when was the first time we jammed?  I don’t even know… the first thing that comes to mind is a song called “Forest,” which I played live at the Decibel show…  No, there’s another song, it’s called “Pacific City”…  Me and Zuri went down to Portland.  I think Zuri actually just came down to kick it, just the two of us went down to kick it with the Dropping Gems people.  This is like when I was first getting to know all of them.  And we just hung out and, at one point, we went to the Oregon coast and we went to this place called Pacific City, which was really, really, really incredible.  But yeah, at a certain point, he came over to the house and I had just put together-  Well, I think I might have actually, just done it all at once…  I just played some pads, played some noises, I had a couple different sounds, just a couple different chords on top of each other, or maybe just one chord, and I said, “Hey Zuri, just play some guitar over this” and a week later, I just went in and just chopped up what he had played and put it into a sampler and just played it.  And, because I don’t know how to play piano and I don’t know how to play guitar and, because like of all these things… collaborating with people who are really talented like Zuri, who is, first of all, unbelievably talented, but he’s also got exactly the same (well not exactly the same) but in the exact same continuum that I am, in terms of taste and definitely in terms of melodic sensibility, is great.

Of course.

And, during the Decibel show, he was really blowing me away.  He recorded that set -or, someone did- and I don’t know where it is.  I meant to record it, but was too flustered in the process of getting everything set up.  It just turned out to be just a really happy accident.  It wasn’t really an accident, but really an organic thing that I didn’t have to plan at all.  He would just come in and play over the things I made, I’d chop it up in the sampler and it would add so much.  We did a couple more songs that way and it developed into a thing that was just really, really fruitful from a production standpoint, and I realized, if we can do this in the studio, this would be perfect live, too.  He came through and played at the Electric Tea Garden and it was amazing.  It really helped my anxieties, ’cause there’s a general sense of anxiety when you’re playing music like this that is generally done in a studio ahead of time.  When you’re not like, just pressing play on an Ipod, which I have literally seen people do before…

Right *laughing*

So, having it be done as much live as possible is really important thing for me and I’m not anywhere near where I want to be in terms of that.  Like, I just do what I can at the moment and, as I get to be a better musician, I’ll add more.

Well, I think the stuff you’ve done with Zuri always sounds really natural.  I think, a lot of times, when people have another instrument come in, it can sound weird, but I was actually playing your EP with my boyfriend -this is kind of an aside- but he said, “God, this would be really great with some guitar over it,” and then all the sudden Zuri comes in and he was like, “oh! Perfect!”  So, I think it feels really natural and makes a lot of sense.  And, I guess I have a lot of questions, too, about how you put your music together on a technical level.  I mean, I have NO knowledge about the process of making electronic music; like what programs you use or how you put it together, but I guess I’ll save those for later when you show me how it works.

Having seen your previous show and having heard the stuff that’s been coming out on compilation CDs, I think I heard a much more obviously complex kind of a sound from you, like you were saying about the show that I saw; that you were really kind of throwing everything out there.  And it seems like a lot of your recordings have been showcasing a lot of different skills that you have technically as a DJ.  When you came out with your EP, or your stuff that you’ve been working on longer term, the sound seemed to be a lot simpler on the surface.  Though, seeing you live, I feel like I could tell the complexities in the beats, which kind of moved around a little bit, subtly changing tempos.  Why did you make that change in your sound?

Well, it wasn’t that much of a change for me, really, because that’s how I’ve always done it.  I just hadn’t released any of it, so no one really knew.  When DJing, I’m so eclectic and I’m drawn to so many different things…  The biggest distinction, though, is that I’m playing other peoples’ music and not, you know, not mine.  I’m not creating that stuff that I play.  Anyway, the thing about my live shows is that I don’t have a template or formula for making song, and I don’t have a formula for structuring songs in the middle of making them and, especially if I come back to something that I was working on… anything new that I do will be different than what I was originally doing.  It’ll be in the same vein, but… you can really tell on the fourth track of the EP, “Moon Sun Ravine,” there’s the part where the voice is and then, there’s the part with the guitar.  And they were both made months apart from each other.  And so, you can just tell.  And, for some people, the switch may be too much.  I know I had long conversations with people, in Dropping Gems specifically, who just said,”the guitar is too much, it’s too jarring.”  I agonized about that for a little while, but eventually, I decided to keep it.  But, in any event, the reason why tempos change and beats change is because that’s just what happens when I play the songs.

Right, I wasn’t meaning that in a negative way.  I really like that, actually.

Yeah.  No, I mean, I have plenty of thoughts about what to say like, “Well, you know, life is always changing.”

*Laughter*

But seriously, life is never in a lock-step meter.  You know, every day could potentially be a revolutionary day.  Like, if something crazy happens and you have to upend your whole life… that’s kind of what this summer’s been like for me a little bit.  Things have finally settled down, but also there’s a lot of points on the EP and in my live set where there aren’t any drums at all.  It’s just ambient.  And then, drums come in and that’s kind of similar to the patterns of life, you know.  Activity and inactivity, or inspiration and depression, or whatever else you want to say.  So, the EP is also narrative, so it really has a specific narrative…  It’s like a trip, like a walk in the woods, you know?  And there’s stops and starts to that experience, too.  There’s parts where you’re walking down a hill and you might trip, or other times where things are just mundane and you’re trying to stay in line.

So, just to clarify, the narrative is the movement of someone through….?

Well, it’s just natural environments, forests, specifically.  Obviously, it’s not a specific place, it’s more fantasy-based than that.

I think you can definitely feel that in the EP.   Obviously, the names of the songs tend to imply that naturalness.  I guess that, to me as a listener, hearing some of your stuff that’s more rhythm-heavy and complex, compared to the ambient sounds that you have on the EP, it definitely seems to be much more reminiscent of nature as opposed to mechanics.

Yeah, definitely.  I mean, that’s the thing about… I love electronic music…  I was thinking about this the other day.  It’s probably the genre of music where the most exciting things are happening, just in general.  But, you know, there’s a significant history to electronic music and a lot of the pioneers…  I’m not like a hard electronic music nerd.  Especially with pioneer stuff.  I mean, I might get myself in trouble for saying this, but… I don’t like rigid, harsh, computer sounds.  I just don’t.  That’s what a lot of people make and that’s actually what’s popular, essentially.  Mid-range dubstep that has a lot of spikey computer sounds and huge over-compressed kicks and snares, it sounds like robots screaming and stuff.  There’s definitely a nice, enjoyable side to that music, but it seems like there’s way more bad than good and there’s way more inorganic electronic music.

Do they do that to put an emphasis on skill?

Well, not so much that, it’s just an aesthetic.  It’s a harsh aesthetic, and it’s an aesthetic that lacks a lot of mechanic rhythm.  It honestly, just has a lot to do with people partying.

It’s different for me, because I use a computer as my main instrument, but I don’t want to express robotic ideas or cold, synthetic ideas, or rigid ideas.

One of the cool things, I think, about the EP is that, because of the ambient sounds and getting away from the more mechanical aspects of electronic music, where the beat isn’t the emphasis, but has a large effect on the feeling of the music, it seems to have an appeal to more people who are outside of the electronic music world.  Were you intentionally trying to reach outside of that scene?

Well, not really.  It’s something I want, but it’s not something I’m explicitly aiming for in my head when I am making the music.  Part of it’s just that I have pretty eclectic taste and I like seeing a lot of different things live, you know.  I actually went to my first death metal show on Friday and it was a really extreme scene, but it’s really awesome, too.  I just got booked for a show in Portland and I’m playing right before the headliner and it’s just an indie band.  No one else on the bill is electronic and to me that makes perfect sense.  I don’t want to appeal to just one crowd and… there’s people I know I won’t appeal to, but…  I mean, I would love to appeal to everyone.  I guess I’m kind of insecure that way, you know, I’d love if everyone liked me.

*Laughter*

But, I don’t think that I want one scene or audience versus another.  And I like to make people feel comfortable and to communicate positive information and feelings, especially in a live setting where people are congregated together.  It’s nice to be able to communicate that individually to people through their headphones or whatever, but specifically when I’m physically there performing and creating sounds where there are a lot of people congregated to hear it, I really, really want what I’m transmitting to be positive.  I mean, I have a lot of music and I play these things that communicate a negative state of mind, but I try to do it in a way that’s enjoyable or at least uplifting.

There are a lot of artists, in my genre specifically, who are about being as harsh and nasty as possible and people go to those shows and are like “Yeah play the crazy shit!” and I totally respect that and sometimes I feel like that.  Like I said, I went to this metal show and it was awesome, but it was definitely some of the heaviest and most brutal stuff I’ve seen live.

Well, that kind of leads into what I think is going to be one of my final questions.  For you, what do you think are the advantages to playing a live show vs. a studio recording and vice versa?

Well, live shows are totally different, because (with) in studio recordings, I’m spending hours and hours and hours trying to find the right sounds and put them together correctly and getting them all mixed and balanced correctly, and to get the thing I’m looking for, which I only have the vaguest idea about and don’t really know it until I find it.  It just takes forever and it’s emotionally kind of harrowing and it’s just a mess and it takes a while.  And then, once I’ve found it, I’ve found it and it’s like a happy accident and I can enjoy it.  And in a live performance, it’s just about communicating that hard work to people in the most accessible way possible.  The most important work happens in the studio and the live show is like a celebration of what I’ve managed to find.  And I get to do some of it live, so it’s interesting to watch, but mostly it’s like, “Look what I found, guys!”

I know you mentioned this earlier and you didn’t really have a chance to talk about this, but you brought up that there were certain people who (you) felt like witnessing their live shows was really influential to you and (I was wondering) if you’d like to talk about it and how it influenced you….

Well yeah, James Blake is the pinnacle to me, as far as this section of electronic music goes, and he is a polarizing figure, I guess.  But to me, he’s the only person who has taken, well… I mean, I read an interview with him once and people asked him, “What’s your live show going to be like?” ’cause he was still developing it, and he said, “Well I just want it to be like Mount Kimbie’s philosophy on it.”  They’re another British group and they’re similar, but they don’t take it quite as far as James Blake, which is for him to basically play every note live.  Which is… it’s electronic music.  It’s made over multi-track on a computer -he makes it himself in his bedroom- but when he tours, he has a guy playing the drums and a guy playing the guitar and using a sampler, and he’s singing and playing the keyboards, and every sound that you hear on the record (and it may be slightly different) is being made live and being produced live and, to me, that’s the ideal.

So, do you see yourself moving in that direction in the future?

I have so many plateaus I have to reach before I can do that.  I have to learn to play the piano, I have to learn how to arrange for a band and I have to find…  I think Zuri would be a perfect person to tour with, which is why I do, but I’d have to figure out where I fit in and how I could have control over the sounds that I want to have control over.

Flying Lotus is another person who tours with a drummer and Thundercat is a bass player from LA who’s like, amazing.  He’s at a computer consul doing stuff and controlling the sounds and letting the band members go wild, which is kind of what I do, but way, way, way less talent and control in my situation.

Mount Kimbie are another good example, but they run a lot of stuff off samplers.  They play guitar live and they play drum pads live and stuff, and they have a snare that they hit every once in a while, so they’re another good example of that.

Shlohmo’s newest album is really organic and he uses loops, which is another option potentially, but I like playing with other people.  It’s basically, translating what my really personal ideas are and having control over them and then expanding that to include other people.  It’s a tremendous challenge…

Also Brown Bear, who is in Dropping Gems, has a project where he plays with a full band.   And Toro y Moi, one of my favorite beatmakers, had one of the best albums in 2010, and now he plays with a band and his music is different, because he plays with a band, and it’s amazing, but it’s just not what I would have wanted him to do, just because I love that one album so much… but, it also reminds me that it’s just not something that I think I’d be able to do to full satisfaction for a few years.

Thanks so much for talking to me about this.  I think we should wrap up this section of the interview and head over to see how you make your music.

Sounds good.

………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

After the interview, Alex let me come check out his studio, where he demonstrated how he creates a track from scratch.  It was a really great way to end the day and to round out some of my newfound knowledge of the electronic music artform.

[Unfortunately, the flip cam recording the footage doesn't capture the bass very well.]

LINKS:

Find out more about DJAO from the following links…

DJAO on Facebook
DJAO on SOUNDCLOUD
DJAO Dropping Gems Profile

His EP, Wuhn, can heard and/or purchased by “name your price” through here: http://droppinggems.bandcamp.com/album/wuhn

His more recent release is an installment of the No Northwest series put out by the Car Crash Set Label.  The series is an effort to spotlight Northwest producers and is a split EP, which he shares with HxdB, a Vancouver producer.  Two of the tracks are from DJAO; one being a solo piece called, “Just For Today” and the other, “Meditation,” being a collaboration with Yuk.  It is his first “for-money,” wide-release EP and is available for purchase at the following links:
BeatPort
AMAZON
Boomkat

Photo Credit:

Header image taken by Parvaneh Angus.

All other images are provided courtesy of Lara Schneider.

[CLICK HERE to jump directly to giveaway]

Back in the early 2000s, I lived in Olympia, Wa and there was a lot of DIY music and media production happening in the small college town.  People were mixing albums in their basements, silk-screening posters and T-shirts in their kitchens, and using DV, High-8, and/or Super-8 cameras to record short films in dusty fields and damp alley ways.  My friend Mac Dawg was taking advantage of the fact that we had a local public access station to create his own programs.  His original idea was to film a fictional, biopic-style sitcom based around Kurt Cobain in the 80s, referencing his tenure as an Olympia resident.  Being a Jewish Puerto Rican in his early twenties who had dread locks and mutton chops at the time, he came to the conclusion that I would be the perfect person to star as the dead, blonde, white grunge-rock icon in the re-imagining.  The project never actually came to fruition, but, during a random house party at Mac Dawg‘s house, I came up with my own idea for another program by the name of “TANGENT.”  The basic premise was that I would have guests on, like an informal talk show, and then just consistently shift the topic on them.  [I only have brief glimpses of memory pertaining to coming up with the idea... I was really drunk.]  One morning Mac Dawg wakes me up with a phone call and asks if I’m ready to do the show.  “What show?” I asked.  I thought that he might be referring to the Cobain thing again.  He explained that it was my idea and that I should get ready, because he was planning to film it that morning.  I threw on a slim, denim 1970s pantsuit (just vest and pants) and a large plastic dollar sign necklace, bought a case of OLY stubbies and came up with/scribbled down some topic ideas onto a piece of scrap paper during the ride over to his basement, where the video equipment was set up.  Between being awaken to sitting in the basement getting miked, it was probably 1/2 hour total.  It was about 9am, I had taken down enough alcohol to get rolling and we went from there.  There was no real podcasting back then and there was no Youtube whatsoever.  There was no real direction for the program either and, although I’d like to believe that it had it’s moments, there was a decent amount of aimlessness involved.  I imagine that doing an improvised standup routine must be similar to trying to carry an unscripted program and helping it to remain interesting; it can get awkward quicker than you may think.  If I we could have harnessed those select moments, expanded them, and worked tirelessly on them for years, I could still only have hoped to yield something half as effortlessly smooth and entertaining as the podcast, “Uhh Yeah Dude.”

Tangent only made it to about 5… possibly, 6 episodes (for good reason).  UYD, on the other hand, just clocked in their 300th episode, since their 2006 inception, just last week.  With no particular frills, regularly scheduled celebrity guests, or even a consistently designated theme, the staying power of the program rests solely on the shoulders of its two co-hosts, their abilities to expand upon and quickly interject life into whatever topics that they do find themselves on, and their undeniable rapport with each other.  Visually somewhat of an odd couple, Jonathan “JAH” Larroquette is a bearded, cigarette-smoking, longhaired, vegan that generally remains seated while sporting either worn-in T-shirts or tanktops, while Seth Romatelli is a clean-shaven character with a finely coiffed do (rockabilly light?) consistently standing and/or moving about in, typically Western-cut, collared button-ups.  If Larroquette‘s name sounds familiar, it’s because he is, in fact, the son of Emmy award-winning actor, John “Dan ‘Reinhold‘ Fielding” Larroquette (Night Court).  He is also 1/2 of the electronic duo JOGGER that was signed to Daedelus‘ Magical Properties label, released an album back in 1999, and went on the Magical Properties tour with the electronic pioneer/label-head and Nosaj Thing back in 2010 (a tour that his dad tweeted about accompanying him on).  If Romatelli‘s name sounds familiar, it’s probably because you are already aware of the Uhh Yeah Dude podcast.  Either that, or you might be a huge fan of his bit part as a “talent organzier” in the Britney Spears vehicle Crossroads (2001) or as an obsessed celebrity memorabilia collector in the Hallmark made-for-tv movie, McBride: Anybody Here Murder Marty? (2005), starring his co-podcaster’s father a year before their hour-long web series was ever launched.  Whether it’s John‘s dad or Seth‘s appearance in a shitty teen film, neither Larrouquette or Romatelli shy away from their history, but that’s clearly not the basis of the program at all and, at the most, those topics might very rarely surface in the midst of their continuous banter.  What really carries the show are the hosts’ unrestrained social commentaries and back-and-forth between each other.  I haven’t listened to that many pod casts in general, but I have always gotten the impression that they were hosted by “experts” in one field or another, or that “experts” were often brought in to weigh in on some subject matter.  What’s great about UYD is that these guys don’t really claim to be experts in anything.  What they do, however, is make their listeners want to be involved in the topics themselves and, regardless of how absurd or trivial the topics may technically be, they definitely get the mental cogs churning and explore some visually descriptive avenues while they explore them.

Here’s a bit of a breakdown on the podcast and it’s success, via the press release:

Described as “A weekly roundup of America through the eyes of two American-Americans”, Uhh Yeah Dude (UYD) is available free via the Apple iTunes store.

Uhh Yeah Dude is a comedy podcast containing discussion and free-form comedy by host Seth Romatelli and co-host Jonathan Larroquette. Episode 1 of Uhh Yeah Dude first aired on February 11, 2006 and quickly gained a world-wide fanbase.

UYD is consistently ranked within the top 10 of Podcast Alley’s 3,000+ comedy podcasts. Additionally, Podcast Alley monthly ratings for almost 50,000 podcasts often rank UYD in the top 100 podcasts worldwide in all podcast categories. Since the summer of 2008, UYD has held a coveted spot on the front page of iTunes’ featured podcasts, where they are consistently in the top 50 iTunes comedy podcasts. Uhh Yeah Dude is recorded weekly and a new episode is available on iTunes every Sunday.

The show has utilized the video format several times. The first, and most famous, was when the duo recorded their 100th episode and posted it as a video podcast. Since then, UYD has engaged more professional video help and posted high-quality video clips of their show on YouTube.

Considering that the best way to really get a grasp on what UYD is all about would be to experience it, we’ve included a few of the aforementioned YouTube video here for your viewing pleasure.  In these following clips they tackle such serious issues as…

DRUGS:

Click here to view the embedded video.

PARENTING:

Click here to view the embedded video.

and…

PARENTING with Drugs:

Click here to view the embedded video.

You’ve likely noticed that some of these clips were filmed in front live studio audiences.  That’s because, occasionally, UYD will go out and do live tapings of their podcasts in venues around the country.  On Friday, January 13th the guys will being make one such appearance at the Neptune Theatre here in Seattle.  Coincidentally, Friday the 13th was one of the topics on their recent 300th episode.  Also, somewhat coincidentally (but not really, because that’s what this post is created for), our friends at the Seattle Theatre Group provided us with a pair of tickets to give away to one of yooz lucky jerk awffs.

Tickets can be purchased for the event HERE

BUILT TO SPILL

City Arts Fest 2011

The Moore Theatre

Seattle, Wa

10.21.11

I first heard Built to Spill from across the hall in the dorms.  When I lived in the dorms, I tried to keep myself off the radar.  The natural manner that my floor mates had with group dynamics made it clear that they were the fittest Darwinian specimens and that I was going extinct.  It came to a point where I, more or less, waited until I was confident that the halls were clear, before coming and going (a habit that has, unfortunately, penetrated into apartment life as well).  In the dorms, I became very skilled at dodging social interaction with the  people that I lived around.  However, some things are inescapable: things that become the air you breathe in such close quarters.  You can’t burn enough sage to satisfy the evil spirit that is the pervasive smell of Easy-Mac.  There is nothing that you can do to soften the rumble caused by charging stampedes of post-shower man-boys.  And certainly, you cannot close enough doors to dampen the constant noise of dormish this-and-thats.  Built to Spill was part of the “this and that”.

Up until recently, BTS was a sound I tried to filter out.  The guy across the hall from me—a gold medalist (to my silver) in the Awkward Olympics—had Built to Spill on repeat the entire year.  As their sound waves found their way through the tiny cracks in my particleboard door, Built to Spill became the backdrop of my dorm experience.  All that to say, I was truthfully, very excited to get the chance to see them perform at the Moore Theatre during this year’s City Arts Fest.  “Yeah great!  I’ve always wondered what they would sound like without a concrete wall between them and me.”

With my ear to my apartment door, I waited until the last rattlings of passersby had settled and then, made my way to the show.  I arrived at the theater to see five middle-aged guys on stage, all wearing loose fitting t-shirts, and either cargo pants or relaxed jeans.  I could have easily mistaken them for the road crew, if it weren’t for the ecstatic sounds radiating from everywhere in the room except for the stage.  The band enters casually and with a remarkable ease.  Built to Spill brought their living room with them, and now you are standing in it.

“Who are you, who come to me to perform in loafers?” I wonder, as they begin their set.  Before this night, I had felt strongly that shows stripped of showmanship had no place in the world.  With the soft-but-fierce competition in media, every band makes arguments and bids for your attention.  Built to Spill offers neither bells nor whistles with their set.  I am a little amazed that they have a following at all—let alone one that easily fills the Moore to capacity.  What Built to Spill gives up with showmanship, they have to make up in musicality and meaning—and that’s what people are here for.  People are clearly not at this show for a spectacle.  There is none to be had.  To quote Keanu Reeves in the blockbuster hit, Speed, “We’re just (2,436) cool dudes, hanging out.”

I begin to re-evaluate my prejudices against showless performances and start focusing on what everyone else in the room cares about: the music.  The sounds are truly elating, as they’re coaxed out of a bramble of pedals, switches and amplifiers.  The ambience of their three-guitar lineup is balanced against the very melodic, occasionally baroque-like movements in their songs—it’s an odd half-breed of shoegaze and jam band.  Even though I have very little interest in either shoegaze or jam band, the way that Built to Spill rides the line is emotive and serene.

I lost myself for a moment in the sad fanfares of Traces.  In case you didn’t know, it’s been proven that infants recognize and respond to music that their mother listened to while pregnant with them.  Subsequently, it’s been hypothesized that preference follows familiarity.  This is all to say, I feel a lot of familiarity with this song; not as if my mom, while pregnant with me, somehow listened to this song 20 years before it was recorded, but like I was indirectly informed of these sounds.  It’s possible that I may have had the seed of Built to Spill planted in my head by the rogue waves that wafted into my dorm room from across the hall.  Even more likely though, in this song, and in Built to Spill’s music in general, I hear so much of what we have come to think of as “the Northwest sound“.

The way in which frontman Doug Martsch bends his strings into a buzz of controlled chaos recalls to my mind the worbly guitars of Modest Mouse’s The Moon and Antarctica.  I listened to Modest Mouse long before BTS, but I am beginning to suspect the actual direction of the comparison: Modest Mouse sounds like Built to Spill, not visa versa.  Despite the two-year discrepancy between the formation of Built to Spill and Modest Mouse, the influence that the prior had on the latter is blaringly apparent.  Deathcab for Cutie also got swept up in the same current of contemporaries.  I can hear something like a seminal Deathcab in Built to Spill’s sprawling melodies, and even in Martsch’s voice.  There’s a fake movie I play in my head in which Ben Gibbard puts on a Built to Spill record and spends hours experimenting with just what shape he has to warp his mouth in order to make his vowels sound exactly like those of Doug Martsch.  By way of familiarity, I am becoming more and more aware that the Boise group isn’t something to shut out, as I have in days past.

By the end of the set, though, I feel a little bit like I’m back in the dorms.  Surrounded by a multitude of people who all have an intimate understanding of what’s going on, I feel lost.  Having been formally introduced to the band only recently, I don’t have any personal significance ascribed to these songs.  To these people, each song is a meaningful, personal experience that I haven’t shared.  Every song is like an encore.  Between the finish of one song and the start of the next, I am surrounded by spontaneous uniform chanting from the crowd.  It’s as if there was a program handed out at the door instructing show-goers what to drone in unison and when.  The faces of the front-rowers are elated.  I can see some not-well-concealed guy backstage who is not at all concerned with impressing his girlfriend by showing any level of dignity.  And he’s not the only one, nor is it just guys backstage.  The room is indignant and ecstatic.  The spectacle that Built to Spill isn’t creating on stage is made up for the fervor of the fans.  My appreciation for the band is far too cold and calculated—lacking all the warmth of meaningful experience—to participate.  So, as in the dorms, I’m on the outside looking in.  Bu,t unlike the dorms, it looks great.  And it doesn’t smell like Easy-Mac.

Prior to October of last year, we had never even heard the name Serge Gay Jr.  Since then, we’ve conducted/published an interview (March ’11) with the artist here on the site and I’ve personally purchased 2 of his works (an original piece and a giclee print).  The last year has shown itself to be quite successful for Gay, finding him earning a Grammy nomination -shared with director/frequent collaborator, Matt Stawski- for his work on Cee Lo Green‘s “Fuck You” video.  As the Bay Area gallery/publishing house, Spoke Art was launching themselves into the art world with their breakthrough Wes Anderson-themed art show, Bad Dads, Serge was catching our attention with his standout contributions to that exhibit.  Since then, Gay and Spoke Art have proven to be mutually beneficial to each others success, as the San Francisco-based painter has continued to submit impressive piece after impressive piece to such Spoke Art events as the multiple round (NYC, SF, LA) “Quentin vs. Coen – An art show tribute to the films of Tarantino and the Brothers,” the Pangaea Seed-curated shark exhibit/benefit “Sink Or Swim,” and  “Bad Dads II.”  This Saturday, the two of them will work together yet again; this time with Serge Gay Jr‘s work finally taking center stage in a solo exhibit of his own.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Not unlike the Haitian-born artist that paints them, Serge‘s work is multifaceted.  His strokes seem as carefree and fluid as flowing water, but the imagery is still incredibly bold an defined.  There are clearly political elements and the pieces can be fueled with plenty of social commentary, but, miraculously enough, they never feel heavy handed.  Some of the figures possess comic-like characteristics while, simultaneously, displaying a remarkable realism.  The subjects pronounce themselves, breaking outward from their framework and accentuating the depth that unfolds in the background.  Transparent ghostlike figures, objects, and text provide narration, breathing life and spirit into the work, providing interplay for the more solid and static figures and objects within it.  The compositions are undoubtedly engaging, but they still retain a high level of ambiguity in their interpretation.  There is nothing flat about the worlds created in Serge‘s paintings.  They possess a cinematic quality in relation to the way that they operate within time.  Sometimes it’s a CSI freeze frame  and the aftermath of a grimy hotel room.  Maybe it’s a slowly stirring clutter of figures.  Other times, it’s an airy surrealistic landscape that’s more cotton candy than concrete.  Their motion can be both stone and erosion… dust and wind.  The figures don’t always move at the same rate or even seem to appear on the same plain, toying with depth and compartmentalization like a diorama.

The subject matter is extremely personal, but maintains a universality.  This is most likely due to the many different defining aspects of Gay Jr‘s personality, as well as in spite of them.  He paints imagery relating to his birthplace in Haiti, as well as architecture and life that is clearly influenced by his current home in San Francisco.  Gender identity, racial identity, global destruction, personal morality… all of these things are addressed, but they don’t seem to create a conflict with Serge as an artist or seem out of place when grouped together in one singular presentation.  As a young artist, he has already managed to avoid the pitfalls that can be faced by the many who choose to limit and define themselves by any one of these particular subjects alone.  Serge is a black artist, who isn’t afraid to address some Afro-centric subject matter, but he’s more than that.  He’s more than a civil rights activist or a San Franciscan, a Haitian, a music enthusiast, a painter… any of those things.  He’s a human being, who’s aware of each of the components that make him a 3-dimensional personality and that’s why his imagery becomes so emotionally soluble.  Whether you’re a black artist, or an Asian artist, a gay artist, a female, an environmentalist,  or a political activist, it doesn’t matter, because if you continue to define yourself or your art by nothing else beyond that one singular aspect, while never broadening the interpretation of that experience, but expecting others to view you or your subject matter as something more than that, it’s unlikely that you or your art will ever present itself as anything more than the stale one-dimensional caricature that you’re trying to avoid.  Serge‘s solo exhibit -titled “Absolute Happiness“- is a great opportunity to finally catch a larger collection of the artists work in one place and to obtain a more well-rounded idea about his voice, what he’s capable of, and why he’s an artist worth watching as he develops throughout the future.

Here’s what Serge Gay Jr. told us, regarding the theme behind Absolute Happiness:

“The theme of the show is called “Absolute Happiness” because I wanted to showcase what the meaning of happiness is to me in all it’s different juxtapositions and trying to search for true happiness. Some people often define happiness as “living a good life” but to me it’s simply defined as an emotion as well as the little things in life when you can’t have it all. Not everyone is born with concept of “mental state of well-being”, but I’ve learned we can learn how to bring more meaning and satisfaction into our lives with what we have, to bring joy. For those, there are no absolute, and for some, it’s a never-ending quest. So I wanted to create a series that invites viewers through my eyes on this quest and most private journey ride to my very surreal, dream-like mind. Similar to a diary, my Art does tell a story of my everyday life of experiencing if it deals with tragic, love, lost, views, politics, travels, friendship, and happiness. As I create this surrealist expression movement that opens philosophical minds and understand my own social theories, I welcome viewers to see a world that I found out to be very unreal in all its complexities. In the end, you still have to go back to the root of it all and find what makes you happy.“

The opening reception for Absolute Happines” will take place at the Spoke Art gallery in SF from 6pm-11pm and will run until the end of the year.  Beyond the obvious reasons to attend the art opening in person, we’ve recently received the following information which pertains to an added benefit…

Opening Night Raffle

As an added bonus for attendees at this Saturday night’s opening, Serge Gay Jr. has generously decided to give away the above-featured painting, “Aperitif” during the night.

Spoke Art will be hosting a raffle for the original work, tickets will be $5 each, and 100% of the proceeds will be donated to the non-profit organization, Hand in Hand for Haiti. A small selection of signed and numbered prints will also be given away to raffle ticket donors.

More info on the organization here:
http://handinhandforhaiti.com/index.html

ADMISSION IS FREE!

Here’s the lowdown…

DETAILS:

What:

“Absolute Happiness”: Solo Show by Serge Gay Jr.

When:

Opening:
Saturday December 3th: 6pm – 10pm

*Show on view until December 31st*

Where:

SPOKE ART
816 Sutter St.
San Francisco, CA 94109

LINKS:

Serge Gay Jr: http://sergegayjrart.wordpress.com/
Spoke Art: http://spoke-art.com/
Facebook Event Page: http://www.facebook.com/events/272075719495243/

The following is a small selection of advanced images from the upcoming exhibit.

[CLICK IMAGES TO ENLARGE]

Brick by Falling Brick

36″ x 48″

One Third

16″ x 20″

Joe Blow

16″ x 20″

Over Flow

18″ x 36″

Gold Fishs

6″ x 8″ each

Color Me Black

20″ x 24″

I have no problem admitting that I am a fan of Ace of Base’s hits or Amy Grant’s “Baby Baby.” I do not appreciate them in some kind of ironic way, either.  They are good songs with catchy hooks and skilled song craft, and so is “Kokomo,” but I know there’s a difference.  I know that I shouldn’t like it.  “Kokomo,” written by Mike “Douchebag” Love, Terry “Doris Day’s son” Melcher, Scott “Mamas ‘n’ Papas” McKenzie and “Papa” John “Incest” Philips, is a sax-and-steel drum accented chart topper about some douchey resort in the Florida Keys that Mike Love liked to frequent.  The song came from a Tom Cruise movie that I have never seen.  Mike Love sang lead.  At the request of Disney, Carl Wilson and Al Jardine redubbed vocals that were originally sung by Terry Melcher.  The Beach Boy who had no involvement in this #1 single was Brian Wilson.

“Kokomo” is the antithesis of all that is supposed to be holy about “America’s Band.”  According to legend, the Beach Boys never released any “good” music before or after Pet Sounds, and they certainly never released any good music without Brian in the driver’s seat.  Those who venture into pre-Pet Sounds territory, on the other hand, discover classics like Surfer Girl and The Beach Boys Today!  Those who venture into post-Pet Sounds territory discover winners like Holland that Brian had very little to do with.  If the Byrds, Pink Floyd, and Depeche Mode can produce smash hits without their key songwriters, why couldn’t the Beach Boys?

As it turns out, with Brian’s two brothers (Carl and Dennis), cousin (Love), and aspiring dentist friend Al Jardine, the Beach Boys could too.  Mike Love may have been a tool who wasn’t as talented as Brian, but then again, John Lennon was a tool who wasn’t as talented as Paul.  And “Kokomo” is certainly a better song than “Happy Xmas (War Is Over).”

The unreleased SMiLE album is the holy grail for “Kokomo”-hating Beach Boys fans.  According to legend, Brian’s brilliant Pet Sounds follow-up, described as a “teenage symphony to God,” would have eclipsed Sgt. Pepper.  After the project was canceled, the Beach Boys released the more simplified Smiley Smile in it’s place.  Later Beach Boys albums would also include a few cuts from what would have become -the still fragmented- SMiLE.  In 2004, Brian finally finished a version of SMiLE with his touring band and released the CD to critical acclaim.  But there’s just something about hearing SMiLE in late-60s medium fidelity with Carl singing the crucial middle harmonies.

The SMiLE Sessions, finally released this month by Capitol, includes the closest thing to a finished Beach Boys SMiLE possible without overdubbing anything new.  The only problem is . . . the album was not finished, and the unfinished SMiLE, put together from studio scraps, is not as good as either Smiley Smile or the Brian‘s 2004 version.

Sonically, The Smile Sessions is the best that it can be.  Although Brian is one of my favorite record producers, there are things about his 60s production style that I do not care for.  Brian’s love of lush, stacked arrangements was not compatible with 60s recording technology.  Since he had only four, or -later- eight tracks to work with, he bounced four or eight tracks down to one track relentlessly.  In those days, each bounce meant a notable loss in fidelity, particularly in the high frequencies.  The snare drum in “Heroes And Villains” is a perfect example of what happens to sound with generations of destructive analogue bouncing.  For this reason, I find that, in spite of the rapidly improving recording technology, the first production credited to Wilson, 1963’s Surfer Girl, with its more spare arrangements and lack of studio trickery, actually sounds considerably better than the album Brian was working on four years later.

In spite of its moments of beauty and genius, SMiLE was a project as self-indulgent as they come.  Brian’s collaborator, Van Dyke Parks (who, incidentally, played accordion on “Kokomo”), known for his own terrible album Song Cycle, does not help.  Much of SMiLE is half-baked, over-effected short-attention span music a la A Wizard, A True Star.  “Good Vibrations,” successfully fused “modules” recorded in three separate studios together into one song, but even on the similarly constructed hit “Heroes And Villains,” none of the edits on SMiLE are as seamless and well-executed as those.  “A musical journey from Plymouth Rock west to Hawaii, complete with a suite devoted to the elements, a song about physical fitness, and a minor key cover of ‘You Are My Sunshine’” doesn’t seem like such a good idea once the pot wears off, or once the rest of the band, who still has to tour while the main songwriter stays home in LA, gets back and listens to it.  The Who wisely gave up on Pete Townshend’s similar Lifehouse project, releasing the ubiquitous Who’s Next instead.  The Beach Boys did the same with Smiley Smile, a record that I enjoy more than either Who’s Next or SMiLE.

Some of SMiLE’s best tracks, like “Cabin Essence” and “Surf’s Up” did not make it onto Smiley Smile, but that is understandable.  Prior to Pet Sounds, the Beach Boys had been releasing three or four records per year.  Almost a year had passed since Pet Sounds and the record company wanted a product.  If some of the best songs needed more time and energy to develop, or if they would sound out of place on the minimalist home-recorded Smiley Smile, there would always be a future record or two.  Some of the other SMiLE songs ended up sounding better on Smiley Smile.  “Vegetables,” which is fairly unmemorable in the heavily produced version on SMiLE, is brilliant in its creepy just-bass-and-vocals arrangement on Smiley Smile.  “Mrs. O’Leary’s Cow,” which is abrasive and silly on Smile, is beautiful and hypnotic as reinterpreted in Smiley Smile’s stripped-down, slowed-down “Fall Breaks And Back To Winter.” “Our Prayer” and “Cabin Essence” made it onto 1969’s 20/20, and a superior version of “Surf’s Up,” based on the original studio tapes, augmented by Carl “The Man With The Pipes” Wilson’s lead vocal, a Moog, and 70s fidelity, appeared on the 1971 album Surf’s Up, one of the band’s best works.

Anyone who wants to sit through a record that’s good from start to finish will be better served by Smiley Smile, Surf’s Up, the 2004 Smile, or many other albums related to Brian Wilson and the Beach Boys than by The Smile Sessions.  But, in some ways, The Smile Sessions does, in fact, deliver the goods.  It is nice hearing the familiar songs with Beach Boys harmonies and this version of the album does sound better than the Pro Tools-edited bootlegs that I came across years ago.  But the end of the first disc and the entirety of the second disc, while not intended for casual listening, are fascinating for anyone who is interested in hearing how one of the greatest minds in pop music works his magic in the studio.  Brian’s “Surf’s Up” demos and instrumental sections of portions of “Heroes And Villains” are audio gold, and not only to fans like me who even bother to own the Party!/Stacks of Tracks two-fer CD.

SIDE NOTE:

The aforementioned Party!, released in 1965, contains twelve mediocre performances of acoustic songs, mostly covers, with corny banter in between and overdubbed “party” noise.  On first listen, the album comes across as a total cash-in for the Christmas season and fans who would buy anything.  It was precisely that.  On the other hand, the passing decades have declared it the precursor to the MTV Unplugged craze, well ahead of its time.  Brian’s latest single at the time, “The Little Girl I Once Knew” was a flop.  Disc jockeys despised the song because it contained the avant garde sound of silence before the chorus.  Party!, on the other hand, generated a #2 hit, the Beach Boys’ famous cover of The Regents’ “Barbara Ann.” As a matter of fact, Party! originally outsold Pet Sounds.

Brian clearly wanted to make big, serious records, but the public wanted to “party!”  Still, the modular, ambitious “Good Vibrations” became the band’s second #1 single.  The Beach Boys dropped the SMiLE project.  In place of the proud “Produced by Brian Wilson” label on its sleeve, Smiley Smile contained the phrase “Produced by The Beach Boys.”  Aside from a couple of bizarre and interesting records in the late 70s, America’s band were never Brian’s band again.  Twenty-one years passed.  Dennis had drowned.  The band had tried even its hand at Culture Club-esque synth pop on their Steve Levine-produced eponymous 1985 album.  Then, it was 1987.  The Beach Boys released their first #1 hit in 21 years.  The song was “Kokomo.”

Winners have been contacted.

[CLICK HERE to jump directly to giveaway]

The first time that I saw an episode of PORTLANDIA it was after getting a heads up about it from a friend on Facebook.  The IFC original comedy series was officially premiering on the network that week, but the debut episode was already up for free viewing online (we were actually going to embed the episode back then, but the screener was only temporary and set to expire).  I can’t remember who it was that posted the link and I can’t remember exactly what they had to say about the show, but I do remember that they were encouraging others to watch it and, although they were very general in their statements, they explained that the show was parodying some very specific Portland and Pacific Northwest tendencies.  My response was a half-joking inquiry about if the whole show as about organic foods/free range chickens and bicyclists.  I watched it.  It actually was.

Living in Seattle and not traveling anywhere near to the amount that I used to in my yoot, it’s easy to forget that the rest of the country can be so much different than out here.  This is especially true after moving from a place like Olympia, which falls in between both Seattle and Portland but has an even higher concentration of co-op, anti-corporate protest, DIY, organic farm, ethics and attitudes; without the contrast of the businessmen and right wing types that inevitably mingle throughout and co-exist in it’s larger metropolitan neighbors.  Portland and Seattle have Whole Foods and PCC, while Olympia primarily just has small legitimate co-ops that don’t have CEOs behind them.  Some people in Seattle still don’t know what quinoa is (incidentally, neither does spell check).  Good luck going to potluck in Oly that doesn’t have at least one dish with “hippie grits” in it.  You can still get butter on your popcorn in these cities instead of simply brewer’s yeast.  So, I forget to what degree that Portland and where I live in Seattle are still so heavily liberal, earthy, slim pants, and hip.  Then, occasionally, every ridiculous cliche can collapse in on itself around you and everything becomes painfully and hilariously absurd again.  But would anyone outside of the area even get the references or give a shit?  On the other hand, maybe the only people that would laugh at this show were the folks that didn’t live in the immediate area at all.  It didn’t take long before an answer regarding the level of universality for the program came; within a couple of weeks everyone seemed to be instructing each other to “Put a Bird on It“.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Written/created by and starring the duo of musician-turned-comedian-turned-fake musician/parody, Fred Armisen (SNL) and indie music hero-turned-NPR blogger-turned-actor/comedian, Carrie Brownstein (Sleater-Kinney, Wild Flag), PORTLANDIA has managed to find the perfect formula to not only make it successful, but to springboard itself prominently into the public consciousness within an extremely short period of time.  That distinct intersection of corporate metropolis and new age, hipster, and slacker ideologies that is created in a city like Portland is what helps to put a fine point on every commentary and skit featured on the program.  This is because there is generally at least one person reacting and/or in opposition to whatever’s being presented in the skit and it’s that conflict of personalities that often makes the show interesting.  The other major factor that makes PORTLANDIA so successful is the credibility.  Brownstein is a well-known fixture of the Northwest city and there’s an added dimension to the commentary when there’s a clear affection for the environment that they’re taking shots at, versus a malicious assault by outsiders.  It’s the same reason that Les Claypool‘s satirical view of the jamband scene in his film Electric Apricot worked so well, because he’s an insider, but an objective one that sees things from all angles.

The 2nd season of the highly-successful IFC sketch comedy program airs on January 6th and the duo will even be heading out on select show dates for a sold out live tour, beginning at the end of this month and following throughout January.  For those who are huge fans of the program, know huge fans of the program, or simply want to catch up before the new season starts, the first season of PORTLANDIA will see a release date for both a DVD and a BLU-RAY/DVD combo format on DECEMBER 6th,; just in time for the holidays and a month before the debut of season 2.  Thanks to our friends at MVD ENTERTAIMENT GROUP, we’ve been provided with 2 copies of the BLU-RAY/DVD pack for giveaway.  That means we will be choosing 2 different winners. (enter below).

Gang Gang Dance

Neumos

Seattle, Wa

10.14.11

Let’s get this straight: “I am a total snob, a pseudo intellectual, and an occasional dilettante.”

I know this about myself.  At least I should get some Buddha points for being mindfully (if knowingly) self-aware.  I appreciate most genres of art and music.  I even admire my own openness to various genres when I’m alone with myself in my car.  I may pop in Four Tet, followed by Blossom Dearie, Elvis Perkins, Arvo Part, and Simon & Garfunkel.  Then, sometimes it’s the Black Keys, Joy division, Toumani Diabate, Ukulele Ike, Hello Seahorse, and Jurassic 5, finishing off (haha) with Guns N Roses.  The juxtapositions of my car DJ skills have me liking myself right through my morning commute.

One of my biggest snobby glitches is this: When I first hear about something, after it has already become a little too popular with the local hepsters, a wee switch goes off in my brain which keeps me secretly “above” whatever it is (at least for now).  Let’s call it snob-tourettes.  I bide my time.  I hold off until this brilliant (or not so brilliant) pop group, painter, movie, or writer passes through the imaginary threshold of popularity and into the passé; I subconsciously wait for it to be uncool enough for it to be cool enough for me…and then I sit back and take it in for the first time.  Maybe (probably) I haven’t even really paid attention to it before this.  My snob-tourettes has wrestled my tiny Buddha to the ground.

Lately, I have been openly rooting for my better self.  I do aim to grow to appreciate art on its own merits, god damn it!!  So, when an opportunity to cover the Gang Gang Dance show at Seattle‘s Neumos came, I jumped at it.  I – mostly – missed the slow swell of psychedelia that was Gang Gang Dance’s rise to international notoriety; a fact (sadly) that would usually inhibit me from listening for at least a couple of years.  This was the better-self-test that I needed; a prime opportunity to step willingly on to a popular alternative band wagon, or at least be open to it.

So, then and there, I committed to attending the show.

I prepared myself with a very limited crash course on the Manhattan music/art collective.  Some of the music was familiar to me already, but, previously, I had tried to ignore it.  So, I listened a little more, but not much better.  I watched a few youtubes.  I read the MonsterFresh.com interview.  I listened to a few songs on spotify.  I did not want to learn too much.  I definitely did not want to go to the show as a confirmed hater or a fan.  I was hoping to be genuinely converted from the live event.  I wanted to be convinced that they were worth the hype; alternatively, I wanted to be justified in shunning their popularity.

Here’s what I learned about Gang Gang Dance before the show:  The band has been termed many things: avant-garde, experimental rock, art-punk, world beat, tribal-electro-pop, & electro clash.  They tour with friend/artist/band-member Taka Imamura; he has been described as the band’s “spiritual advisor.”  They have some songs that last 11 minutes.  Okay…so definitely unconventional…and, in my mind (though I was trying not to pass judgment), they started to seem a little gimmicky(?)  I stopped my research there.

When October, 14th came, it was one of the first rainy cold nights of autumn.  It was dark by 6pm and I had trouble with even the thought of leaving my warm little house.  Attending the show didn’t feel like a good idea anymore.  Nobody really cares if I like popular alternative music.  What was I proving exactly?  I wanted to read a book in my bed, not shake it on the dance floor.  I was going, but I was not in the mood.  To top it off, the venue (Neumos) sits in the center of Seattle‘s Pike/Pine Corridor!  The show was in the middle of “Weekend Party Central” and it was Friday night!  I got into my car.  It was so rainy and so cold.  I drove.  I questioned if I’d find parking?  I thought that I might be late, I was tired, and I had limited expectations.

Then, out of nowhere, events aligned.  Is there such a thing as a divine trance-rock-fairy?  Did it give my kvetching inner humbug a smack down?  I don’t know what magic suddenly occurred, but the evening got lovely.  I found parking instantly (unbelievable prime, free, parking).  Then, I met an awesome pair of friends at the door.  I breezed through the photo pass scenario and had a drink bought for me.

Light anxiety turned to contentment.

Woosh, there I was, happy and sharing a cocktail with a friend.  My car was parked for free on a Friday night.  I had missed most of the opening band, but I would catch all of the Prince Rama set before the headliners took the stage.

Prince Rama is a sister act from Brooklyn, NY.  The band is made up of sisters, Taraka & Nimai Larson, friend Michael Collins, glitter, sequins, and an eighties jump suit.  Wikipedia states: “Originally raised on a Hare Krishna commune in Florida, and educated at an art school in Boston.”  This is the most succinct and descriptive wiki statement I have ever read, and sums up Prince Rama perfectly.  They definitely reminded me of the other kids of hippies that I grew up with.  Their performance reminded me of the haunted houses and rituals that I would invent with my childhood girlfriends.  All in all, they played tribal-psychedelia, with an earnestness of pre-teen girls or art school kids.  One of the sisters (Taraka) ended their set by chanting “trust, trust, trust…” and falling into the crowd.  They were young (20’s?) and probably deserving their own little review, but it was getting late and, by the time they left the room, I was ready to fall asleep on my feet.

At last, the members of Gang Gang Dance arrived on the stage.  They didn’t seem like they were in any hurry.  Things were being set up pretty casually. Instruments were getting their final tunings and Lizzi Bougatsos was emptying a leather bag.  Out of the bag came a small wooden, African (?) devil (?) mask.  She put the mask in front of her face all nonchalantly, like… umm… she was just checking to see if the mask still worked and as if no one was watching.  Then she took out a black bustier and tossed that down in the small pile of purse contents.  The pile contained percussion sticks, mallets, and other things that I couldn’t quite make out. “This could go either way” I thought.

The audience pressed closer together.  I stood with my hands on the stage and to Lizzi’s left.  The crowd was diverse.  A guy who was in his mid-forties and was sporting the classic ex-grunge rocker look was pushed up against my right arm.  Standing behind me was a Northwest skinny pants, horned-rims and fedora guy.  To my left a girl (barely of age) was in a new-agey-gypsy get-up swinging her arms in anticipation.

Lizzi said hello to the crowd.  She wore black gladiator heels, a black cat suit with back cut-outs and a sheer black-metallic button up with the giant tags still on it.  She said something about the Occupy Wall Street protests, which I didn’t understand completely.  When she spoke, she sounded a little like Fran Drescher (which was all that I could think of).  Then she thanked to Prince Rama and summed up my feelings about the opening band by asking sincerely, “Aren’t they cute?”  They were cute… exactly.

A series of color saturated video projections began: still, moving, and layered.  The rest of the band took their places.  Brian Degraw placed a drum stick in his mouth and laid into the keyboards.  There was a gradual spacey drone filling the room; like new age wind chimes set to heart beats.  Then the music transitioned into what sounded like traditional Arabic music.  One moment it seemed like a massage therapist soundtrack.  Next it sounded like “We built this City” by Starship.  Suddenly, the percussion kicked in from all directions (Brian Degraw on drum pads, Jesse Lee on the drum kit, and Lizzi drumming along at center stage).  The music morphed in to a tribal rite of passage.

Bougatsos’ voice was like some odd combination of Kate Bush, Cocteau Twins, and Grace Slick; with a hint of Sinead O’ Connor (from “I Am Stretched on your Grave”).  It was spacey.  It was techno.  It was hard core(?)  Wait… hold on… sometimes it was like that scene in Divine Secrets of the Ya Ya Sisterhood (okay, pretend you haven’t watched it, if you’re “too cool”) when the little girls are chanting around the fire with homemade tribal headdresses.  At moments the front-woman wailed, then she cooed, screeched, and sometimes she was barely audible at all.

Brian Degraw ceremoniously placed a scarf over his head like a holy man.  A large white triangle was projected onto the video screen.  The words “positive” and “energy” were visible on two sides of the projected triangle.  The image slowly rotated.  “Was I being inducted into a secret society?”  If this was a cult, then it was kinda okay by me, because the music was extremely danceable.

Taka Imamura swayed around the stage looking for things to do.  Sometimes he danced to the beat.  For a while he held (what looked like) a large tumbleweed.  He carried the tumbleweed/sculpture around the stage, placing it behind the singer’s head, walking it to different odd locations on the stage, or holding it over his own head as he negotiated the crowded stage like a cartoon shaman.  At one point, he and Lizzi held hands and casually danced through the crowd.  How many bands have a spiritual advisor on stage?  He didn’t play an instrument or sing, but it was clear that he was considered an integral component to what the group was doing as a whole.

One song became another, or there were minute pauses in between.  I tried with my limited knowledge to distinguish between them.  My sense was that, aside from the few die hard fan-geeks, it was hard for most attendees to pick out a set list.  It could have been one long song; one uniform experience: visuals, players, audio, costumes, and color palette.  I felt transported.

Taka arranged a white sheet/scrim in front of Jesse Lee’s drum kit so that the drummer’s head was barely visible and so that the projected images (which were getting denser) could take up most of the visual space on the stage.  The visuals shifted from glittery constellation objects to swaths of saturated color blended with layers of metallic video mesh.  Some of the projections were in shades of teal, fuchsia, indigo, apple green, red and white.  Colors and sound flashed together, pulsed to the music, or oozed like a lava lamp.  The room obtained a Willy Wonka ferry boat feeling.

I loved the odd sense of cohesion,  equally combined with the more experimental elements of when they didn’t seem to know what they were doing.  Near the end of the show, Josh Diamond accidently broke a guitar string.  Taka took the opportunity to grandiosely stretch that string out from the instrument; making a new electric screech as diamond played the five others that remained fully attached (I should add Lizzi joined the string pulling, as well).  The whole spectacle was both luscious and silly.  They appeared to ride the line between taking themselves way too seriously and acting as if it was all complete nonsense.  The music was solid, but the stage performance had some looseness to it.  Being goofy, bad ass, approachable, and spiritual -simultaneously- has got to be a fairly difficult task to pull off successfully

I have been trying for days, but it’s really difficult for me to relay the experience.  My mind, just sort of, flits around when I try to pin down the details.  The band’s gestation in the New York art scene might explain some of it.  Certainly, there was a flavor of performance art.  Have you ever seen footage of old Factory happenings; Beuys in his heyday, early CBGB shows, or even the Sound Lab (cultural alchemy) work coming out of the East Village in the late 90’s?  Maybe this comes from a band having spent over a decade together?  Another set of players and these components could have seemed easily like a glib spectacle, but, for Gang Gang Dance, it didn’t come across like that at all.  They seem oddly self-aware, but also raw and honest about what they were doing.

After the spectacle was over, the members of the band cleaned up their gear.  The bustier & African mask (which were never used) were put back into the oversized bag, and Lizzi Bougatsos sat at the edge of the stage.  She spoke to those that waited around.  She invited people to stay and hang out.  She sincerely thanked the fans for coming out and supporting the band.  She hugged and took pictures with those who came close.  This morning I watched an interview in which Bougatsos states that she literally picks a member of the audience, which she feels connected to, and that she sings/performs to them.  In my opinion, the success of the show was built on this sort of communion.

I went home feeling glad that I had the opportunity to attend.  My only wish was that I had spent less time thinking about it and more time letting myself go.

Gang Gang Dance has been playing larger shows and festivals lately.  This year, they performed at both the Animal Collective-curated ATP Festival in Minehead, UK and The Pitchfork Music Festival.  Growing popularity means that there may be fewer opportunities to experience the intimacy that makes this band so special.

The result of my little self-experiment is this: I learned that -yes- I am, in fact, an snob-idiot when it comes to being too concerned about what other people are and are not listening to.  The band’s current release Eye Contact is now in permanent rotation on my morning commute.  But, more than listening, I am looking forward to an opportunity to see Gang Gang Dance live once again.  I am converted and, so it seems, are the masses.  These smaller shows may soon become history and so, I encourage you to jump on this band wagon as soon as possible.  I implore you: “Shake it while you can!”

Click here to view the embedded video.

MAN MAN

City Arts Fest 2011

Pacific Science Center [laser dome]

Seattle, Wa

10.22.11

Man Man’s most recent album, Life Fantastic, was a long awaited release that saw the band making some adjustments to their sound, incorporating strings into the background, and developing a more refined sound in their production. To me -a longtime fan- these changes were (and still are) a little difficult to adjust to, but not enough to make me lose faith in the group.  The major change for me was that, for the first time, their recorded material didn’t match up to the feeling of their performances.  While the songs were still “fantastic” and held the same influences of gypsy, klesmer, and 50s music, the sound on the album lacked the pure energy that Honus Honus and the rest of his troupe pour into their live shows.  But, as I came to realize more through my last opportunity to see them perform, this may be a very positive reflection on Man Man, allowing people to see each of their two sides clearly.

The quintet’s performance at the Pacific Science Center‘s Laser Dome was unique to say the least, considering that the venue is generally intended for an audience that is either seated or lying on the floor.  Normally the space is used to project laser light shows onto the ceiling which are synced up to studio album recordings.   But even in this unusual space, the concert reflected a certain kind of inimitability that is present in all of the Philadelphia-based group’s recordings.  Man Man has always managed an impressive mixture of the chaotic with the beautiful, blending hard rhythms and harsh vocals with highly emotional and deeply resonant lyrics.  There’s a feeling of desperation, sadness, and anxiety that imbues much of their music.  Heartbreak, loss, and placelessness are common themes that give emotional weight to their songs.  Honus’ Tom Waits-style crooning fits incredibly well into both the chaotic efforts like “10 lb. Moustache“, as well as their more emotional tracks like, “Whale Bones” or “Van Helsing Boombox.”  His coarse voice breaking over notes gives an added sense of truth to the emotional content of many of these songs.  It says something incredible about a band when their raucous performances and wild style are their draw, but their most muted and haunting songs become fan favorites.

The juxtaposition of their high energy performance with the hypnotizing and peaceful laser show, was a good illustration of these two competing elements in their general musical style.  But unlike the band, who manages to combine these two aspects both subtly and artfully, the concert setting seemed inharmonious, forcing the audience to either concentrate on the physical performance or on the laser show happening above their heads.  The venue was clearly not designed for live acts, with the musicians performing between two stacks of speakers on the carpeted floor, separated from the audience by nothing but a simple strip of masking tape.  This made the band hard to see unless you were standing right up against the makeshift stage.  Honus Honus gave the rest of the audience a peak at their routine by climbing up on the speakers during some of the more wild songs, like “Haute Tropique“.  More subdued tracks, like their usual opener, “Feathers” -which also opened their sophomore release Six Demon Bag (Ace Fu, 2006)- offered good opportunities to view the laser show, since the band would be difficult to see anyway.  In these situations, the back of the room was actually the most desirable spot in the venue, providing the best view of the light show.  Before the performance began, it appeared to be a more promising scenario, overall, as everyone was seated on the floor or in the chairs.  Some people were even lying down.  It looked as if there was some general confusion as to what the situation would be for the show; whether it would be a seated event, etc.  It seems like the venue really demands that the audience remain on the floor but, unless it is explicitly stated, it feels like it would be an impossible expectation to maintain.

One advantage of the venue was that the sound quality was fantastic.  Since the main purpose of the space is for use during musical light shows, the sound really filled up the room and its dome shape made it so that, no matter where you stood, you would still be able to hear.  This really gave clarity to the other instruments and the harmonies, which the band does an incredible job of putting together.  I loved being able to appreciate the complexity of the songs without having to stand in just the right spot in the venue to get the best sound.  Since every musician in the band has an important role to play in most of their songs (other than the very minimalist songs like “Feathers”), it’s refreshing to be able to hear and appreciate the details.  Although Honus Honus gets the most recognition, each band member contributes an enormous amount.  Christopher “Pow Pow“ Powell holds down the drums in imaginative ways, while the other three members (Chang Wang, T-Moth, and Jefferson) switch between wind instruments, horns, percussion, and vocal duties, among others.  Each member of this vivacious group goes through musical acrobatics throughout every performance and it’s a shame when those efforts can’t be heard.

The concert was really gearing up with their performance of “10 Lb Moustache” when it seemed to take a strange turn.  There was applause, a pause… was this the end?  The lighting changed, but the band went ahead with “Life Fantastic.”  Was this the encore?  It seemed like too short of a set for it to already be the end.  Soon the door to the lobby opened and you could hear the blaring of fire alarms from outside.  The gypsy-influenced tune continued until the sound was cut off and the audience was herded out from the laser dome.  We were in a unique situation, since the Pacific Science Center is an enclosed complex; also including an Imax theater and a children’s museum.  Everyone was left milling around the fountain pools that take up most of the courtyard space.  No one wanted to leave, but no one knew if we’d be allowed back in.  Thankfully, it wasn’t long before Honus Honus entered the crowd with an acoustic guitar and began to sing, accompanied by Chang Wang with saxophone, Turkey Moth on the melodica, and the other 2 members quietly playing percussion and trumpet.  Along with the exiled audience, they performed an incredible rendition of “Steak Knives,” one of the most emotional and intense tracks in their songbook. “Step step, step your heart up.  Step step, stitch the holes up,” the entire crowd intoned.  Seeing several of the concert goers wading through the pools to get a better view/sound, Honus stepped in to join them, finishing the song while knee deep in the cold water.

After the singalong, the authorities instructed everyone to leave the complex, but the band hung around to take photos and talk with any stragglers.  I was able to speak to Honus briefly and he confessed to me that he had stepped into the water because he felt bad that his audience members were getting wet and cold and he wanted to stand in solidarity with them.  This kind of humble and gracious attitude towards his fans provides an extra special feeling to the group’s performances and adds a tinge of truth to the earnestness conveyed in their chaotic yet casual style.

In the end, Man Man’s concert at the Laser Dome was a perfect demonstration of both their frenzied and their melodic sides.  The insanity and confusion surrounding our evacuation from the venue seemed to match up with the energy of the harder songs in their catalog.  Perhaps, this is mostly because of the orderly way in which the crowd exited regardless of our uncertainty.  The touching acoustic rendition of “Steak Knives” worked to showcase the other extremes in their repertoire.  After intentions for an elaborate, hi-tech concert/laser show turned south, it was this simple and casual final performance that found the band deeply engaged with their audience and what, ultimately, ended the night in the most befitting of ways.
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[The next day the following footage was posted on the official Man Man facebook page from a user by the name of "Running Stills"]