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Friday, September 30, 2011
On Stage #8 - Alcohol Impairs Judgement
A continuing series of insights from the stage at the local club level...
8. Take drunkenness lightly from up there. Drunken audience members can love or hate you at the drop of a hat, sometimes due to something as simple as misunderstanding a lyric or stage banter. Similarly, next time you're trashed at a show, remember the "reason" you've started grumbling may not actually exist. I've seen this one from both sides.
Thursday, September 29, 2011
NoMeansNo
Who:
Where:
When:
When:
By some measures, I came late to the NoMeansNo party; not only did I not like them at first, I originally assumed they were a Christian band (giving The Worldhood of the World As Such a casual listen, I completely misinterpreted songs like Humans, Angel or Devil, and He Learned How to Bleed). I bonded with them in the late 90s over Live and Cuddly, but it took time and many forced listenings at the hands of friends. Once it sunk in, it really sunk in, and I've called NoMeansNo my favorite band for more than ten years. I could bore any reader to sleep with obsessive descriptions of my various hard-to-find vinyl EPs and NoMEansNo errata-- I'm that kind of fan.
One couldn't expect the Bumbershoot crowd to be filled with fans (though I met a few die-hards in line), but NoMeansNo didn't play what I'd call an “accessible” set-- one of the great things about the band is that they're challenging and diverse, and whoever wandered into the Exhibition Hall while they were playing was going to see a challenging and diverse show.
To their credit, NoMeansNo opened with one of their more uptempo and poppier songs (Angel or Devil) before following up with one of their odder, Devo-bounce, lock-step tracks (Can't Stop Talking). For the uninitiated, this would have been a fine crash course in NoMeansNo's sense of variety: they played slamming, straight-ahead hardcore punk (Theresa, Give Me That Knife), a slow, patient, atmospheric song (I Need You), some bass-and-drum groove songs where the guitar sits out (Metronome and Big Dick), some of their chanty/spoken word stuff (Brother Rat), a cacophonous noise jam (the end of What Slade Says), and some of their more layered, newer material (Something Dark against Something Light.)
For me, this was a thoroughly satisfying set... even if no one was allowed to jump around. Bumbershoot's "No Moshing, No Stage Diving" policy was strictly enforced. A small pit broke out during the second song; not only was it quickly dispatched, but one-by-one, for the following 20 minutes, security came back and removed everyone involved... a constant procession of flashlights and escorts through the crowd.
The band was in top form-- the rhythm section of bassist Rob Wright and drummer John Wright is one of my favorite drum/bass combos anywhere. The bass is heavily driven with a bright midrange, and can hold down full songs without a guitar in the mix; the basslines are often metronomic, tightly locked rhythmic loops, but can break into strummed chords or even lead lines, depending on the song. The drums reflect a lot of jazz and prog influence, both with twitchy, off kilter hat/snare work and bigger, more sonically imposing beats that rely on accents within the constantly rolling toms or snare. The Wright Brothers can (and will) play straight, standard, 4/4 punk rock, but their ability to lock into strange repeating patterns, odd loops, and tricky rhythms is a large part of what makes NoMeansNo such a unique and enduring band.
One couldn't expect the Bumbershoot crowd to be filled with fans (though I met a few die-hards in line), but NoMeansNo didn't play what I'd call an “accessible” set-- one of the great things about the band is that they're challenging and diverse, and whoever wandered into the Exhibition Hall while they were playing was going to see a challenging and diverse show.
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| my camera displays this band as a brightly colored blur, so: From Nothing But Words Photo by Mike Toppa |
For me, this was a thoroughly satisfying set... even if no one was allowed to jump around. Bumbershoot's "No Moshing, No Stage Diving" policy was strictly enforced. A small pit broke out during the second song; not only was it quickly dispatched, but one-by-one, for the following 20 minutes, security came back and removed everyone involved... a constant procession of flashlights and escorts through the crowd.
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| my camera displays this band as a brightly colored blur, so: From The Sun Break Photo by Shawn McClung |
The band was in top form-- the rhythm section of bassist Rob Wright and drummer John Wright is one of my favorite drum/bass combos anywhere. The bass is heavily driven with a bright midrange, and can hold down full songs without a guitar in the mix; the basslines are often metronomic, tightly locked rhythmic loops, but can break into strummed chords or even lead lines, depending on the song. The drums reflect a lot of jazz and prog influence, both with twitchy, off kilter hat/snare work and bigger, more sonically imposing beats that rely on accents within the constantly rolling toms or snare. The Wright Brothers can (and will) play straight, standard, 4/4 punk rock, but their ability to lock into strange repeating patterns, odd loops, and tricky rhythms is a large part of what makes NoMeansNo such a unique and enduring band.
Since NoMeansNo began as a duo, their original guitar sound was very bright, kind of harsh, and usually kind of dissonant, which kept the guitar out of the way of the massive bass sound. Their current guitarist, Tom Holliston, has been with the band since the mid-90s, and brought a fuller, richer sound to the band (usually playing humbucking Gibsons and sometimes using echo); Tom's a great fit for what the band has evolved into, being both more melodic and heavier than original guitarist Andy Kerr. When NoMeansNo goes into a guitarless song, Tom sets down his instrument and takes on lead vocal duties.
Though Rob is most often on lead vocals, all three members of NoMeansNo can sing and all have songs where they take the lead. While I make a big deal of all the band's rhythmic complexities and their ability to change on a dime, surprise an audience, or have a song explode into a thrilling climax, their ability to write a big, unshakable chorus can't be ignored. With the three of them singing, NoMeansNo has no trouble with three part harmonies, call-and-response, or melodic counterpoint. Their show has no shortage of captivating, well written melodies and choruses to balance out their weirder, more inscrutable songs.
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| my camera displays this band as a brightly colored blur, so: From TheStranger.com Photo by Suzi Pratt |
Nothing like this happened at the Bumbershoot show: the band looked like they were having a blast on stage. They were high energy and fun, cracking jokes, and (in Tom Holliston's case, when he put down the guitar) even dancing. NoMeansNo had no intention of stopping, either: the band was ready to break into another song when the venue called time on them. They played a great set, and, if they're sometimes too strange to be all things to all people, those who've acquired the taste for Canada's most consistently rewarding power trio * finished this show thoroughly satisfied.
Tuesday, September 27, 2011
On Stage #7 - Tuning
A continuing series of insights from the stage at the local club level...
7. String players-- get a tuner. No crowd wants to hear a band play The Tuning Song on stage, especially if they have to hear it more than once during your set.
Saturday, September 24, 2011
Bumbershoot
Bumbershoot is an annual Seattle music festival, taking place roughly at the base of the Space Needle in the Seattle Center. A collection of indoor and outdoor performance spaces, 
Bumbershoot is a fairly big deal in Seattle, attracting crowds from all the outlying areas and bringing in not just downtown music types, scenesters, and enthusiasts, but also lots of suburban families. It's a big event, but it's also a family event.
Bumbershoot is a fairly big deal in Seattle, attracting crowds from all the outlying areas and bringing in not just downtown music types, scenesters, and enthusiasts, but also lots of suburban families. It's a big event, but it's also a family event.
There are a variety of stages at Bumbershoot, so sound varies from place to place as you switch from open air stages to concert halls to theaters. Most of the spaces are large, and everything comes through the PA-- all the drums are mic'd (and often pretty reverb-laden), so boomy and cavernous is the general mix personality.
There is also a “No Moshing, No Stage Diving” policy that makes sense when you're standing next to someone's 85 lb. grandmother during a punk show, but it was so viciously enforced that the line of kids being escorted through the crowd and out the door seemed endless. I can't tell if they were all part of some previous pit, but I definitely saw docile, unoffending kids pulled from right in front of me... we can file that under “not too cool.”
Friday, September 23, 2011
On Stage #6 - Know Your Gear
A continuing series of insights from the stage at the local club level...
6. Don't play with gear you haven't practiced on. No matter how excited you are about your new instrument, effects pedal, microphone, etc-- if you haven't rehearsed with it before the show, don't use it at the show. It's a recipe for disaster.
Tuesday, September 13, 2011
Fungal Abyss
Who:
Where:
When:
When:
The first thing I knew about Fungal Abyss was that it included the members of Lesbian, easily one of the best metal bands in Seattle. I was told they're a psychadelic group, a bit on the jam-band side of the spectrum; for me, that's one tick in the positive column (yay, psychadelia!) and one in the negative column (blech, jam bands)... but I like these players, have seen Lesbian many times, and wanted to see them before the opportunity faded. I caught them at the final night of their weekly residency at the Comet.
Fungal Abyss contains both guitars, bass, and drums from Lesbian, but adds a third guitar, a suitcase modular synth, and a vocalist. The biggest surprise from a band with three guitarists on stage is that Fungal Abyss is not notably guitar driven-- the bass and drums propel the music along, and the melodies, textures, and sonic freakouts layer themselves over the top. My strongest comparison for the group is Miles Davis' Bitches Brew era, a kind of free form 70's electric funk groove, with no shortage of swirly modulations, trippy echoes, and wah...
The music comes with a light show, too-- a projector set up by the sound board, providing an expressionistic backdrop for the music... when dipshits weren't making bunny ears in the light. It was a 21+ show at a bar, so I'm certain they weren't in third grade, but once they discovered they could throw shadows, the couple back by the light source kept it going. Still, I appreciate a band with a visual component to their shows, and the projector was a really nice touch.
Sonically, the suitcase modular synth gives a good idea of where the band is going. This isn't a band with a keyboard player; a collection of knobs and patch cords, the synth generally doesn't care about the key of the song or the root of the riff. This synth is in the mix for UFO takeoff noises, weird shrieks, wobbles, and electronic blips and blurps. It is a specifically textural instrument.
The vocals, on the other hand, are melodic and atmospheric-- no lyrics, as far as I could tell, but Fungal Abyss is big, spacial, and textural, so actual words would probably be too literal for the mood. Run though a handful of effects, the vocals range from a solid tenor to swooping falsetto, sometimes carving out a melody, sometimes hitting accent beats, and sometimes working as a strange special effect (for example: the Blixa Bargeld inverse scream).
The band comes together as the truest representation of a psychedelic group I've ever seen. Where many bands self-applying the moniker are blues bands with a phaser pedal and semi-surreal lyrics, Fungal Abyss truly allow a song to build, bend, trip out, climax, and turn around to find another direction. The music hearkens back to the swirlodelic 70s, but isn't really a retro act; it pushes forward as a 7-piece, huge, but not cluttered.
Fungal Abyss on Facebook
Monday, September 12, 2011
On Stage #5 - The player is not the audience
5. The sound on stage doesn't have
that much to do with the sound in the crowd-- monitors vary,
relative positions to amps and drums vary, and room acoustics vary.
If you're lucky, someone in the crowd that knows your songs can tell
you if the guitar's too loud of the bass is overwhelming (and ask
them: I fully endorse asking the crowd), but onstage, just accept
that the crowd isn't hearing what you're hearing.
Even limited to my experiences, this list is nowhere near complete. I planted it as one of the first pages when I began this blog with the very first handful of points from the quickest surface skim of my gray matter. It will continue to grow.
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