The Cave Singers at The Earl (Atlanta - 6/5/12)

Seattle-based folk-rockers The Cave Singers are a band born from the ashes of others.  Founded in 2007 by former Pretty Girls Make Graves bassist-turned-guitarist Derek Fudesco, vocalist Pete Quirk of Hint Hint, and drummer Marty Lund of Cobra High, The Cave Singers have cobbled together a distinctive sound that is very much their own.

It is a sound both balmy and bleak, delightfully twangy and occasionally raucous yet quietly melancholy at the same time, all blended together with a shrewd maturity that could easily confound them for an act far older than five years. It’s the kind of music that’s perfect for a melancholy Sunday—just lively enough to brighten your mood, just weary enough to appeal to your hangover.

Recording their first album, Invitation Songs, mere months after the breakup of Pretty Girls Make Graves, The Cave Singers have been on a steady track ever since, following up with two more excellent records—2008’s warm and breezy Welcome Joy and 2011’s rather darker No Witch—both of which have become personal favorites of mine. The band has passed through Atlanta several times since then, most notably as openers for  fellow Seattlites Fleet Foxes, but somehow I kept missing them. In fact, it was not until this past Tuesday evening at The Earl in East Atlanta that I was finally able to experience The Cave Singers live.

The show began with two very different but not particularly memorable opening acts: the mellow country blues of Shane Tutmarc and the spastic garage punk of Dan Sartain.  Finally, after a bit of hemming and hawing, The Cave Singers took the stage.

The night’s lineup included the three founding members plus Fleet Foxes bassist and flutist Morgan Henderson, who rounded out the quartet quite nicely with his rich, multi-instrumental sounds. However, it was vocalist Pete Quirk, looking like the long-lost towheaded cousin of the Luigi Brothers with his small stature and baseball cap, who really set the tone for the night.   Quirk’s lovably awkward between-song banter and spasmodic little dances endeared him to the audience and provided an interesting contrast with the rawness of his vocals, along with a whole slew of instruments he’d pick up, play, and throw aside—guitar (electric and acoustic), tambourine, harmonica, melodica, maracas.

Drummer Marty Lund provided the steady heartbeat behind Quirk’s warm warbling while guitarist Derek Fudesco was nothing but a mask of shaggy brown hair and sound, completely immersed in his music with no audience interaction whatsoever. The music, however, was great, from the clambering stomp and swagger of “Black Leaf” to the wistful amble and creak of “Swim Club” to a sun-dappled rendition of “Beach House” that made you want to pick it up and wrap it around you like a warm blanket. 

Ultimately, the performance was an apt re-creation of their recorded work, but didn’t really bring anything new to the table, aside from a few unfamiliar songs that hopefully indicate a new album in the works.  The Cave Singers turned out not to be a band that really jams out live, which was a bit frustrating as they seemed like they could be capable of doing so.  As such, while they played a fair number of songs, the entire performance, encore included, lasted only a little over an hour.  Perhaps they forgot that this time they were, in fact, the headliners we all came to see.

The Soulphonics & Ruby Velle at The Earl (Atlanta - 2/10/12)

I love a good dose of sweet and funky soul, especially with a big brassy-voiced female vocalist taking the spotlight.  Which is why it feels like blasphemy that this past weekend was my first ever experience seeing one of the best soul/funk revivals Atlanta has to offer: The Soulphonics & Ruby Velle.

Yes, they took up residence at Starbar, which is walking distance from my house, for a full six months of Wednesdays in 2009, but in all fairness, I didn’t live in that house until 2010 and well... Okay, you get the point.  I was stupid. But not anymore!  Now that I’ve gotten a taste, I know exactly what I’ve been missing, and I will take every opportunity to make up for it.

It was a very chilly Friday evening in Atlanta—the kind that makes all the lily-livered Northern transplants (i.e. me) whine about how we thought Georgia was supposed to be warm, goddammit.  But upon entering toasty East Atlanta mainstay, The Earl, I immediately ditched my coat and settled in for what was surely going to be a wonderful evening of music.  And so it was. 

Ruby Velle, a healthier-looking, Florida-born Amy Winehouse doppelganger with a strong and sultry voice to match, commanded an enormous stage presence that far exceeded her tiny stature.  She was backed by a lively and talented six-piece band, dressed in suits and featuring a rollicking three-man horn section (note: if you want to guarantee a good review from me, just add a horn section). 

The Soulphonics know what they’re doing, and thus are happy to let Ruby soak up the spotlight while they groove out in a semi-circle around her.  They find a happy equilibrium between vocals and instrumentals, never letting their music fade into the background but never overpowering Ruby’s vocals either, despite the volume that a six-piece band with three horns is capable of.  The charming sense of communion between Ruby and the Soulphonics was palpable, and really cast a cozy glow over the whole show, amplified by that special sense of pride you get from seeing a great local band in your own beloved town.

Cool, calm, and totally compelling, The Soulphonics & Ruby Velle strutted their way through an assortment of classic covers and classic-sounding originals, never straying from the boisterous blend of funk and soul that they do best.  From a smooth as butter rendition of Dusty Springfield’s “Son of a Preacher Man” to rousing covers of James Brown’s “Think” and Arthur Conley’s “Sweet Soul Music,” these modern day masters paid tribute to the greats, with a fun-loving reverence that said greats certainly would’ve appreciated.  

The band’s own original catalogue, while small, is stacked with back-to-back gems, from the freewheeling “Feet on the Ground” to the steamy swagger of “The Man Says”, to the mellow glamour of the Soulphonics most recent single, 2011’s “My Dear.”  These original tracks blended nicely with the classic covers, adding to the evening’s overall sense of fluidity. 

Pre-encore closer “Heartlite,” was the runaway highlight of the whole performance, with its exuberantly bouncy melody, catchy hooks, and vivacious vocals waking us from the inevitable lull that such a cohesive bunch of melodies can evoke.

Ultimately, this was the kind of show that just makes everybody feel good, whether they’re dancing, listening, chatting, or all three.  A perfect way to spend a Friday night in Atlanta, and one that I hope to repeat in the very near future.

The Australian Pink Floyd Show Comes to the Fox Theatre

Get ready, friends, for the internationally renowned show that promises to be "the biggest and most spectacular Pink Floyd show on the planet!"  Lauded by David Gilmour himself, this 11-piece tribute band is the only one to play for any Pink Floyd member, with live shows that attempt to recreate the look, feel, and sound of Pink Floyd's later world tours.


The Australian Pink Floyd Show comes to The Fabulous Fox Theatre in Atlanta, GA on Saturday, November 12, and yours truly will be there to report on all the action.

If you'd like to be there too, you're in luck!  There are still a few tickets available here.

To learn more about Australian Pink Floyd, check out http://www.aussiefloyd.com/

tUnE-yArDs at The Basement (Atlanta, GA)

Review & Photos by Hilary Cadigan

I was initially surprised that tUnE-yArDs, the blissed-out brainchild of one-woman melody machine Merrill Garbus, would play in a venue as small as The Basement.  Located underneath East Atlanta Village mainstay Graveyard Tavern, the venue is an awesome but small and somewhat hidden place, with little name recognition since it’s so new.  However, my doubts soon proved unwarranted.  In retrospect, I can’t think of a better place than The Basement—with it’s intimate size and understated allure—for what turned out to be one of the most epically wonderful concerts I’ve been to in a long, long time. 

The sold-out show began with opener Pat Jordache, a Canadian quartet whose creator/bassist, Patrick Gregoire, was once a member of Garbus’s original indie-pop outfit, Sister Suvi.  Jordache’s performance was good, particularly in the percussion department, but weakened by mumbly vocals that sounded like when the guy from The Knife sings in that weird atonal way that only works when it’s sporadic and well-placed.  In this case, it was neither sporadic nor well-placed, only mumbly. It distracted from the skillful melodies that almost but not quite obscured it.

However, these shortcomings only highlighted the flawlessness of what came next.

At last, Merrill Garbus mounted the stage, decked out in a snug black dress with pink feathered sleeves and her characteristically asymmetrical face paint/mullet combo and fiddling with an array of microphones, instruments and wires.

The DIY set-up served as one of the many reminders that for Garbus, tUnE-yArDs is and always will be a truly solo project.  Since she began writing and performing as tUnE-yArDs in 2006, she has melded unbridled creativity, brawny self-sufficiency, and undeniable talent into something utterly unique and deliciously refreshing.  Her first album, BiRd-BrAiNs, took two years to create, and was self-released as a pay-what-you-can download on her website.   

This year’s W H O K I L L emerged as the quintessentially perfect follow-up, and made a huge splash amongst critics and enlightened listeners alike.  Despite the fact that Garbus recorded this album in a studio and added bassist Nate Brenner to the mix, the finished product preserved the untamable charm of BiRd-BrAiNs, and brought to the table an even funkier and more refined sound.  It was my personal favorite album of the year, so needless to say, I had very high hopes for this show.  However, I did wonder how the patchwork production of the album would translate into a live setting.

Quite perfectly, as it turns out.

From first note to final gasp, Garbus had the entire tightly-packed room in a state of elated hypnosis.  Accompanied by Brenner on bass and a Blues Brothers-channeling duo that alternated between saxophone and aluminum pan banging, Garbus shone like an imperfect and thereby infinitely more fantastic Princess Odette (the lead ballerina in Swan Lake—thanks Google). Or King Midas, since everything she touched—from her drums to her ukelele to a row of glass beer bottles to the pipes hanging from the ceiling—turned to sonic gold.

Best of all, however, was her voice itself.  Soulful, funky, and unabashedly eccentric, Garbus’ miraculous vocal chords can transition from a tribal howl to an earnest croon to a low pitched growl to a piercing scream in the span of about one second.  Her expertise in live looping allowed her to build layer upon layer of vocals into an altogether stunning castle of sound, which would suddenly fall away to reveal the kind of self-effacing litotes that clench around your heart and jam it into your throat: “What if my own skin makes my skin crawl?”

Garbus’ true genius lies in her unending ability to build a magnificent sense of wholeness by gathering up and retaining the individual charm of a thousand sparkling pieces.  Tied up in everything she does is the kind of magnetic yet humble personality that could hold a room captive even without musical talent.  Barely pausing for breath after the final line of the night’s last song, Merrill announced that she’d had to go to the bathroom “soooo bad” since the beginning of the show.  Then she dropped the microphone, jumped off the stage, and ran through the crowd toward the public restrooms, shouting, “I CALL FIRST DIBS!” 

Darling, you earned it.

Chromeo at Masquerade (Atlanta, GA)

What do you get when you combine a tall and skinny Canadian Jew named Dave 1 with a short and tubby Canadian Arab named P-Thugg?  No, this isn’t one of those jokes about guys who walk into a bar, although it could be.  Rather, it’s the self-described “only successful Arab/Jewish partnership since the dawn of human culture”: Chromeo.

This electro-funk duo is so damn lovable—from their sitcom-esque disparities to their earnest lyrics to their catchy melodies to the palpable sense of enthusiasm they exude on stage—that one simply cannot have a bad time at one of their concerts.  Even if the venue is devoid of air-conditioning on a particularly sticky night in Atlanta, and the people around you smell like they made a group decision that deodorant may cause cancer and should not be worn.   

At Masquerade on Thursday evening, after a bout of similarly endearing and surprisingly great white-boy soul from opener Mayer Hawthorne, it was time to get the party started.  The crowd—a diverse group of everyone from the polo-wearing UGA contingent to the ATL scenesters to the highly enthusiastic 50-something lady who was getting her groove on right next to me (this review is dedicated to you, madam!)—was visibly amped, diving into the “CHRO-ME-O, OHHHH-O” chants the moment the stage crew brought out the light-up leg keyboards. 

Finally, the impressive array of colored lights began to flash, and the duo emerged, dressed in outfits (Dave 1 in tight-fitting skinny jeans and Wayfarers; bearded P-Thugg in an open vest with his Buddha belly proudly spilling out of it) that only intensified their resemblance to non-evil versions of Aunt Spiker and Aunt Sponge.

What followed was an all-out electric funk-fest, with Dave 1 schmoozing it up on guitar and vocals and P-Thugg unabashedly voiceboxing and synthesizing up a storm.  From “Needy Girl” to “Tenderoni” to “Momma’s Boy” to “I’m Not Contagious”, the duo rocketed through a catalogue of greatest hits from their three LPs (2004’s She’s in Control, 2007’s Fancy Footwork, and 2010’s Business Casual) and had the whole crowd dancing throughout.  They paused only to deliver a heartfelt tribute to their friend and peer, the recently deceased DJ Mehdi, with whom they worked on the song “I Am Somebody” a few years back.

The show ended with a shower of silver confetti, which seemed perfectly designed to coat our sweaty bodies in Dalmatian spots of glittering mylar.  A successful evening, indeed.


Review and Photos by Hilary Cadigan

Music Midtown Returns to the A!

This weekend, Atlanta's Piedmont Park will once again provide a site for one of Atlanta's best-loved--and most missed--events of the year: Music Midtown!

Join me on Saturday, September 24, 2011 for short but sweet line-up that spans 2 stages and includes big-name acts like Coldplay and The Black Keys alongside local favorites like The Constellations.

Tickets are on sale now for $55.  Click the link below for more information and stay tuned for a full review!

http://musicmidtown.com/

Manu Chao at Masquerade Music Park (Atlanta, GA)

By Rob Royall

Manu Chao, on his La Ventura tour, made his Atlanta debut on a perfect night at Masquerade Music Park last weekend. The French-born, Barcelona-dwelling musician has been lighting up crowds with his latin-reggae-ska-punk amalgamation in Europe and South America since the 1980s with bands Mano Negra and Radio Bemba Sound System. Only in the last decade has he begun to achieve recognition in the U.S., highlighted by appearances at festivals like Coachella and Bonnaroo. Word has gotten out that he puts on one of the best live shows around, and on this night, the crowd appeared well-informed.

With a setting sun on the city's skyline as the backdrop, The Masquerade's back yard music park made the perfect venue for the night's performances. The crowd of a few thousand was treated to an upbeat opening set of roots reggae from local outfit The Rocksteady 5. It was a good primer for what was to come.

It should be noted to those who know Chao's studio albums -- but have never seen him live -- that these are two vastly different experiences. His albums may inspire you to go relax by the pool, while his concerts may inspire you to start a revolution. While Chao's multilingual lyrics are full of left-wing politics, it's more the emotion of the performance that gets people moving. The band came out and immediately got the crowd hand-clapping to a groovy reggae number. The feel-good mood quickly turned to feel-great when they abruptly transitioned into speedy ska punk, replete with fist pumping, chanting, and call and response. This slow-fast-slow-fast formula became the norm for the entire show, as the band never settled for long into any style. Over and over the crowd was wooed by soothing, acoustic guitar-driven world music, then worked right back into a fervor by the pounding rhythm section and racing guitars.

Radio Bemba Sound System has been known to include as many as 12 members on stage, including horns, keyboards, and accordion. But, backed by a stripped-down group of only bass, drums, and lead guitar, Chao was more than able to flex some muscle and make the show feel bigger than it was. This was aided by great stage presence, with all band members singing/chanting along, and the awesome guitar work and oft-cartoonish showmanship of sideman Madjid Fahem. Chao himself showed no signs of being 50 years old, while jumping around stage shirtless for most of the night and frequently beating the mic on his chest.

The crowd was appreciative and enthusiastic throughout and were responsible for one of the show's true highlights. During one particularly energetic song, a handful of fans made it up onto the stage and began hopping around and hyping up the band. Predictably, security made an effort to remove these guys from the stage until Chao motioned to them that it was OK. This led to upwards of 30 other people deciding they should join, and the band only played louder and faster, enthused by the onrush and the encouraging cheers of the rest of the audience. This lasted approximately 10 minutes and was a great show of kinship between a band, its loving fans, and a cooler than expected security crew.

Shortly after, the band left the stage, but they quickly returned for a long encore that left the audience more than satisfied. The group may have a tendency to repeat its best elements too often throughout the show, and would benefit from the more varied sounds other instruments offer, but nonetheless give an unforgettable performance. It is clear that Manu Chao and his band love what they do, creating an infectious quality that helps make this and any of his tours a can't miss. 

Glitch Mob at Masquerade 7/15/11

By Hilary Cadigan

FLASHING FLASHING LIGHTS LIGHTS BASS BASS BASS.

If you asked me for a seven word review of The Glitch Mob’s show at Masquerade in Atlanta this past weekend, that would be it.  Unfortunately, my actual word count requirement is a bit higher than that, so I will try to dig through the layers of glowing, pulsating bliss to eke out a slightly more comprehensive account of Friday’s extravaganza. Here goes.

With their seemingly effortless ability to hit a genre-defying sweet spot between hard-hitting hip-hop basslines and cinematic electronic noise, Glitch Mob has created their own brand of raucous dance music with a metallic edge, a more sophisticated precedent for the ubiquitous Dubstep scene that reigns today.

Since 2006, this Californian trio (formerly a quartet—founding member “Kraddy” left the Mob behind in 2009 due to “creative differences”) has been burning up dance floors and blowing minds at clubs, music festivals, and underground raves across the globe.

On stage at Masquerade, after a mysterious last-minute venue changeover from King Plow Arts Center in Westside, the evening began with two perfectly selected openers to get the crowd warmed up in doses.  First came chillwave wunderkind Com Truise, who we unfortunately just missed.  We arrived just as New York-based trip-hop duo Phantogram took the stage, masterfully melding the woozy, haunting vocals of keyboardist Sara Barthel with scratchy-smooth melodies and mesmeric beats.  My only complaint about this performance was for the sound guy—the vocals were often drowned out by the music, which was a shame given how excellent they were.

Then, it was Glitch Mob time. Against a pulsing backdrop of multi-colored LED squares, the three DJs, “edIT”, “Boreta” and “Ooah”, collaborated behind three individual turntables bedecked with their trademark LED light squiggles.  And, from there on out, it was a non-stop dance party.

Glitch Mob had the crowd simultaneously entranced and unable to stand still as the unstoppable trio churned out a seamless sequence of back-to-back gems, from the industrialized groove of “Animus Vox” to the orchestral bleeps and blips of “Fortune Days” to the grand whir and boom of “Drive It Like You Stole It”. The set list, comprised almost entirely of original material, included the majority of their latest album, this year’s excellent Drink the Sea.  And when the Mob did venture outside of their own catalogue, the results were nothing short of spectacular—an explosive rendition of “Seven Nation Army” had the whole crowd screaming and stomping along.

All in all, a seriously great evening. I only wish it could’ve lasted longer.

Dark Star Orchestra @ The Variety Playhouse in Atlanta

Love ‘em or hate ‘em, the Grateful Dead were and are a force to be reckoned with—the blissed-out crystallization of a culture devoted purely to bliss itself. The Dead spawned not only the jam band concept, but the jam band culture, including the raggedy, tie-dyed legions of ubiquitous yet unassuming fans that remain still today determined to keep the dream alive.

Enter Dark Star Orchestra, self-described only as a band that “recreates Grateful Dead shows, song for song, live on stage.”  Yet to call DSO a mere cover band would be doing them a major disservice.  This aint no wedding ensemble folks, this is the pinnacle of devotion, supported by sheer talent and validated by the acceptance of preexisting fan base with very specific tastes.

Since 1997, DSO has performed hundreds of shows across the country, drawing heaps of critical praise for their impressively obsessive attention to detail. The band is known to actually recreate specific Dead shows in their entirety, with ardent artistic loyalty to the original pieces that has been said to wow not only the critics, but even the fiercest of Deadheads, including 5 members of the original band that have played alongside DSO. 

Stepping into the Variety Playhouse for Friday’s show, my first thought was, where did these people come from?  One thing’s for sure, the Deadheads are alive and well, and either I’m not going to the right places to find them in Atlanta or they’re a traveling contingent, following DSO across the country just as they followed the Dead in previous decades. Grizzly old guys with grey manes and foot-long beards mingle with young jam band-aids in dreadlocks and baja pullovers, swaying around like underwater plants and illustrating the 

incredible breadth of influence the Dead still hold, even sixteen years after their demise.

About halfway through a five-hour set that truly blew me away, the bear-like man behind me shot his Red Stripe-bearing fist in the air and yelled, “October 27, 1980! Radio City Music Hall!”  This man definitely did not have an iPhone anywhere on or around his person—he just knew.  As did the majority of other diehard heads in the room, I soon discovered.  “The next three songs will be ‘Truckin’,’ ‘Scarlet Begonias,’ and ‘Fire on the Mountain.’  Then there’s going to be a really epic drum solo.”

Sho’ nuff, there they were, nearly as clear and true as they must have sounded back in 1980, judging by the reactions of a crowd filled with people who would know much better than I.  Coasting along through the catchy shuffle of “Truckin’” to a rousing, jammed out version of “Johnny B. Goode” to a drum solo that was, indeed, epic, to a melt-in-your-mouth rendition of “Casey Jones” for dessert, DSO proved that they have earned their reputation as the next-best thing to a live Dead show.  And really, what could be better for the ultimate Deadheads than masterfully recreating the magic of their idols amidst a riled-up crowd of their own brethren?  These six grey-haired dudes are not only keeping the dream alive; they’re living it, too. 

Review & Photos by Hilary Cadigan

The Walkmen @ Variety Playhouse 1/13/10

Nearly busting my ass trying to get down my ice-encrusted front steps and all but skating to the Variety Playhouse through the virtual ghost town that is Atlanta four days after a five-inch snowfall, I arrived at The Walkmen concert very much in need of some musical defrosting. After enduring The Lower Dens’ underwhelming and rather cacophonous-in-a-bad-way opening set, it was time for Hamilton Leithauser and his men to take the stage.  A lovely stage, I might add, draped in velvet and bathed in soft aquatic-colored lights.

The Walkmen’s music triumphs in its ability to intertwine vocals and instrumentals in a way that feels at once intricately arranged and casually slapped together.  Hamilton’s voice gyrates from the dissonant, bellowing indie-rocker moan to the bluesy, woozy swoon of an old-time crooner.  There are flickers of anyone and everything—a Dylan lilt, a Waits rasp, a Sinatra swing—that come together into something uniquely familiar and familiarly unique.  And the band plays on: sometimes with seas of rolling drums and clanging guitars crashing up against walls of organ (second encore, “The Rat”), sometimes with buzzy little landscapes of spunky percussion and catchy hooks (Lisbon stand-out “Blue As Your Blood”).  It works.

In person, The Walkmen aren’t exactly what one might expect.  Which is to say, they weren’t what I expected. Hamilton Leithauser is undeniably a cutie-pie; however, he looked like he was dressed for a first meeting with his girlfriend’s parents, and aside from his O-face singing contortions, behaved accordingly, with a likable but slightly anemic stage presence bolstered by inoffensive clips of between-song banter.  “Every time we come to Atlanta, which has been about eight times, people always want to take us out after the show.  And every time, it’s always the same place… a strip club. What’s it called, the Carmichael? The Clearwater Club?” Hamilton racked his brain whilst unknowingly inciting a Clermont Lounge chant in the crowd below, which is in and of itself an accomplishment, if not necessarily a difficult one ‘round these parts. Finally: “Oh right, right! The Clermont Lounge!  Yes.  Well we’ve never actually been there, but maybe this time…” 

Something tells me that today Hamilton remains still tragically unaware of the fact that Blondie the 53-year-old stripper can crush an entire PBR can with her boobs. But I guess strip clubs are best referenced only in passing when dining with potential in-laws, so I’ll give him a break.  He also talked about the weather, but given the fact that our little snowpocalypse was enough to shut down the entire Atlanta public school system for a week, I’ll give him a break there too.

Overall, the show was a surprisingly subdued affair, albeit suffused with a not-unpleasant sense of timelessness.  Featuring a good chunk of their newest album, 2010’s Lisbon, amidst a smattering of earlier favorites—including whimsically anti-nostalgic gem “We’ve Been Had,” the first song the band ever wrote and the last one they played on Thursday—the show felt intimate and satisfying, if a bit lackluster.  Straightforward in the same way that Spoon shows can be (and not just because Hamilton looks like a slightly more nourished version of Britt Daniel), The Walkmen delivered a perfectly adequate rendition of their much-loved tracks, but didn’t manage to propel them to any mind-blowing new levels.  

Review by Hilary Cadigan
Photos by Max Blau

Last Aurora and Hollywood Heartthrob at Vinyl (Atlanta, 10/2)

Atlanta-based up-and-comers Last Aurora are a band with enough heart to fill a room much larger than the one they performed in at Vinyl on Saturday night.

Band photoshoot by Hilary Cadigan

Rocking their way through a short set of powerful tracks, the fervent foursome—including vocalist Robeen Dey, guitarist/synthmaster Alex Lafley, bassist Donnie Dey, and drummer Charlie Blevins—forged an instant connection with their small but equally feisty audience.

Frontman Robeen managed to come off lovably despite the bro-two punch of popped collar and Wayfarers-at-night, an impressive feat in and of itself, as he unabashedly Auto-Tuned his voice into a metallic wail that jutted against Lafley’s deft guitar work and Blevins' ferocious live percussion. Noted and appreciated: the drum kit's refreshing placement at the front left corner of the stage rather than hidden in the back as it usually [unfairly] is.

Last Aurora traverses rocky territory with the quick-footed resilience of a young band just starting to get comfortable in a newfound niche. Their sound ricochets between trance, rock, post-grunge, and whatever genre Chromeo is in, but finds cohesion in its consistently compelling delivery, particularly strong on tracks like “List of Men” and “Waiting a Long Time.” The result is a highly enjoyable wash of sound and light that draws you in, wraps you up, and makes you realize that being drenched in processed audio isn’t nearly as offensive as you thought it would be.  In fact, it rocks.

The offensive part of the evening didn’t come until a group of trust-funded ass clowns in tight pants and chemically straightened hair mounted the stage and punished us with a rain cloud of regurgitated pop-punk that pretty much summed up everything I dislike about music. And while I’m at it, I might as well finish my tirade by stating the fact that Hollywood Heartthrob (I know, right) bought all the tickets to their own show in order to tout it as sold-out. Boom. Outed. Cut to me throwing a glowstick at the frontman’s face and finishing my Bud Lite on the sidewalk.

Needless to say, Last Aurora should have been the last performance of the evening.

Download their EP at https://www.mavaru.com/artists/last-aurora/, a pay-what-you-want online music retailer created by Last Aurora’s own Alex Lafley!

Review and Photos by Hilary Cadigan

CocoRosie at Variety Playhouse (Atlanta, 9/21/10)

Part Anthropologie catalogue, part Exploding Plastic Inevitable, a dash of Puccini and a splash of Charlie Chaplin. Throw in some CrazySexyCool-era TLC for good measure and you might have some idea of what a CocoRosie concert feels like.

Yeah, they're pretty easy to hate upon for their whole prodigal émigré shtick, but on Tuesday at the Variety Playhouse in Atlanta, CocoRosie was totally captivating, providing a full-sensory experience of shifting sounds and enchanting visuals that truly blew me away.

In the center of the stage sat an old wooden crib with a slightly sinister-looking baby painted on the side, innovatively converted into a drum kit and flanked by a grand piano, a bright blue harp, a lopsided keyboard, and a table covered in a clutter of battery-operated children’s toys that would later be used as instruments. The place looked more like a pimped-out nursery than a music stage, and Bianca "Coco" and Sierra "Rosie" Casady matched their surroundings well, dressed up like little girls who just raided a fashionable mother’s decade-spanning closet.

Live, the freak-folky sister act succeeds where their recordings fall short, managing to draw listeners fully into the strange, carefully crafted little world they so clearly live in. Heady, uncanny, and slightly cloying, this place is a cosseted fantasy land of lovingly crayoned rainbows and expensive vials of Parisian patchouli. There are plenty of vintage costumes to try on. Come on in.

There’s something a little Flowers in the Attic about the whole affair, but from the floor of the Variety—where throngs of decked out, boozed up cult fans screeched their praises and even, in rare moments of composure, tossed flowers—CocoRosie seemed nothing short of fabulous. As did the truly fantastic beatboxing of lovable Vanilla Ice doppelganger Tez, who wore sweet flip-up sunglasses and possessed some serious skillz on the mic. His 10-minute solo during an intermission was one of the coolest parts of the whole show. 

Also worth mentioning, the stupid fake mustaches that Coco and Rosie have been shoving down our throats lately (gender-bending sensibility: thoroughly noted) were, happily, nowhere to be seen.

The Casady sisters have certainly retained the bond they nurtured back in Paris while recording their first album together, the appropriately titled La Maison de Mon Rêve (The House of My Dreams). Their most recent album, 2010’s Grey Oceans, has a similarly enchanting feel to it. Sierra’s classically-trained soprano bubbles up against Bianca’s grating warble, which kind of sounds like the voice of Danny Torrance’s finger in The Shining (“Red rum, red rum, red ruuummm…” You remember).

In Grey Oceans, the sisters toy with a widened range of influences, all spliced up and pasted together, with results ranging from the intricate beauty of medieval mosaics to the tawdry, gluey messes of overwrought decoupage.

The concert showcased this bold blending at its best. The lovely Judy Garland-esque chorus sandwiched between the mournful vocals, slow-jam percussion, and delicious brass accents of “Lemonade.” The lindy hop patty-cake cameo of “Hopscotch.” The gorgeously danceable “Fairy Paradise,” where smiling Sierra’s haunting coloratura sidles alongside a particularly delightful stretch of stoic Bianca-style lyricism in which “trance music makes the fairies dance.”

CocoRosie is what Tegan & Sara might become if they went to Devendra Banhart’s house, took a whole bunch of acid, and started believing in fairies. “Welcome to New Weird America,” the fairies would say. “You’ll like it here.”

Review & Photos by Hilary Cadigan

Crystal Castles at Masquerade (Atlanta, 9/8/10)

In May, indie-electro duo Alice Glass and Ethan Kath, aka Crystal Castles, released their second LP. It was named, in a typical show of studied apathy, Crystal Castles (II).

I loved it less that Crystal Castles (I), but not very much less. Ultimately, the album proved, like most successful sophomore efforts, unafraid to grow away from the greatness of its predecessor, with that natural ease toward tranquility that tends to come with age. Here, while the happy mix of distortions and syncopations remain, the jagged Atari sounds of their earlier material give way to a new kind of intricate yet hypnotic layering. See: "I Am Made of Chalk," which closes out the album by distilling all the noise into a strange and haunting lullaby of electronic cooing noises reminiscent of baby animals communing with mom animals on Planet Earth. Which is nice.

But, as suggested by the above photograph, at a Crystal Castles concert we do not have these moments of stillness—not once, from opener “Fainting Spells” to second encore “Yes No,” a B-side followed by Glass stalking off stage, as she always does. Don't worry, Alice hasn't grown up. Or if she has, she's not letting on. There was, in fact, a notable sameness between this and pre-2010 shows—they actually played more old stuff than new, but it didn't feel stale.

There's something boldly satisfying in the way CC forces us to work through their electric blankets of curdled noise to get inside the delicious beats underneath. The flailing limbs flailed on through “Courtship Dating” and the spastic shrieks of “Insectica” (featuring a rare moment in which Ethan stepped out from behind his turntable to rock out on the guitar), before accelerating into the double-time, double- spastic wilderness of “Doe Deer,” the ironically-titled sonic translation of a rabid monkey gang-bang.

And while I remain decidedly un-thrilled by the synthy, syrupy futurepop of inexplicable single “Celestica,” it did function better live—providing slight reprieve from the pounding without breaking anyone’s momentum. But "Celestica" pales in comparison to a song like “Baptism” (which I'd like to label the shoulda-been single of Crystal Castles [II]), when the itchy noise blanket is suddenly stripped away to reveal a deliciously clean and catchy techno beat that feels at once classic, rare, and totally rewarding. This, my friends, is something to shake your shit to.

The middle of the show was one big delicious soup of popular favorites from 2008, including “Crimewave,” “Untrust Us,” and of course, “Alice Practice, ” proving perhaps that ultimately, for all their ‘tude and grandeur, Crystal Castles is here to give us exactly what we want. Ethan stoically pumps out the jams in his hoodie while Alice, with kohl-rimmed cat eyes and an entirely black ensemble, shrieks and thrashes amidst an epileptic wash of strobe lights, repeatedly stage-diving into the sweaty sea of limbs below.

As the tired-looking security guards snatched up less-famous crowd-surfers washing up from the aforementioned sea, we on the floor bounced in unison until those achy old floorboards felt like they'd cave in. We watched transfixed as Alice danced atop the drum set and slugged down what I’m pretty sure was a bottle of whiskey onstage. And it’s not like we didn’t know she’d do these things, but we really do love the way she does them. Yeah, she can be a bit of a turd sometimes—from snubbing Texans to pirating blog art to punching Spanish security guards in the face—but for some reason the lady remains, in my eyes, utterly forgivable and totally bad-ass. 

Maybe it’s because she’s Canadian.

Review and Photos by Hilary Cadigan

Here We Go Magic: My First Official Interview!

I’m not going to lie. I almost bitched out.

I’d never interviewed a band before, and I’d planned on descending upon my first such experience with a great deal of impenetrable coolness and informed insight. Upon my arrival at The Earl on August 6th, however, I realized that I was neither cool nor informed. In fact, I was woefully unprepared and kind of sweaty. It seemed best to just watch Brooklyn-based indie rockers Here We Go Magic from the shadowy corners of lameness and then flee the scene. But then, all of a sudden, I realized that this was one of those do-or-die moments, and it was time to do. So I did. And it was splendid! Read on, friends.

Enter Luke Temple, Here We Go Magic’s founding and formerly only member, an amiably disheveled and disarmingly unassuming guy with a mustache. He smoked a cigarette on the sidewalk outside the venue while I fumbled around, trying to introduce myself as someone who was not retarded. I failed, but Temple was totally cool.

“So, uh, where did you get your name?” Proving myself an ultimate noob from the get-go seemed like a safe way to play it. “Well, I was on a train, going to New Jersey and staring out the window at Newark—the toilet of America,” Temple deadpanned. I liked him already. “It was very unromantic, in fact there’s nothing magical about it at all, and I was saying to myself, ‘Here we go, this is really depressing. But maybe I should think good thoughts,’ so I was like, ‘Magic! Here We Go Magic!’ I just flipped it, you know?”

Beginning his music career as a solo act, Temple recorded Here We Go Magic’s eponymous debut album in his apartment, entirely alone. As such, he explained, “the whole record has a real hushed quality, just out of necessity. After work, I’d start at like 8:00 at night and go ‘til 10:00 in the morning. I’d have to play real quiet because I had neighbors and thin walls. It was much more of a personal, internal kind of trip—I did the whole thing on headphones, pretty much sitting on one chair, very simple set-up, very limited. I worked very quickly as a result of that.”

Then, he had to throw a band together very quickly. Due to all the digitally-layered sounds of his first album, there was no way Temple could physically perform by himself in a live setting. Which wouldn’t have been a big deal, until he caught the attention of one Edward Droste, frontman for another Brooklyn-based indie rock band, Grizzly Bear.

“Ed heard ‘Tunnelvision’ on, like, satellite radio while he was on an airplane or something weird like that, and he really liked it so he wrote about it on his blog,” Temple told me, without a touch of conceit. “Meanwhile, I didn’t know that happened. I was visiting my mom over Christmas and I remember checking the computer one day, and normally we were getting like fifty MySpace hits a day, and all of a sudden on this day there were like, fifteen hundred MySpace hits, and I was like, what? Is this some kind of glitch? Was there some kind of back log that just suddenly got filtered through?”

Suddenly, Temple’s little lone musical project was catapulted into the public eye. From there, it was only a matter of time until Droste called upon Here We Go Magic to sign on as openers for his 2009 tour.

“It’s amazing, we became a band and then all of a sudden, like two weeks later, we’re off on this tour with Grizzly Bear. We didn’t even really have our shit together at that point. And it was right after [Grizzly Bear released their third album] Veckatimest, which went to #8 on the Billboard charts. That was when they kind of crossed over from indie to this mainstream success, so we were playing for, like, three thousand kids a night. It was an unbelievable introduction into being a live band,” Temple said. “Plus, I’ve been a huge fan of Grizzly Bear’s music for a long time so that was kind of like a little dream come true for me.”

Ultimately, Here We Go Magic’s evolutionary story is almost uncannily similar to Grizzly Bear’s. Not only did Edward Droste also begin his music career as a solo project, but Here We Go Magic’s dreamlike propulsion into the public eye mirrors Grizzly Bear’s own big break, when they toured with Radiohead in 2008 after receiving some serious accolades from guitarist Johnny Greenwood. In a way, Here We Go Magic has entered into an interesting legacy of musical networking, where the bands themselves select their successors.

Of course, what is music anyway if not a constant progression, a constant cycle of give and take? Luke Temple cites his own evolution from solo project to five-piece band: “Working with a band is sort of a democracy—you have to compromise and be introduced to everyone’s distinct contributions.” This past June, Here We Go Magic released their second album Pigeons—Temple’s first foray into recording with a full band.

Onstage, delicate, ethereal dream-drops like “Fangela” and “Tunnelvision” transform into jangly, freewheeling, almost raucous jam-outs. But it’s a controlled kind of chaos, and what’s lost in sheer sonic beauty is redeemed by Temple’s unflappable likability. He is the ideal anti-frontman—no irritating stage banter, no pretentious airs, no showboating, just passionate grit and humble aptitude. And despite his solo success, Temple remains utterly willing to embrace the fact that being part of a band means relinquishing a fair share of autonomy: “Now that we’ve toured for a year straight, by the time we record the next album it will have been almost two years probably, and I’m really excited about that because we have a dynamic together that we didn’t have when we made that first record, so it’s just going to keep changing.”

Goodbye, Newark. Here We Go Magic.

By Hilary Cadigan
Photos by Christina Krudy and Hilary Cadigan

YACHT (The Drunken Unicorn, Atlanta 3/16/10)

The brainchild of musician and multimedia performance artist Jona Bechtolt, YACHT prevails more as an experience than a band.  In fact, as their website’s official mission statement declares, YACHT is “a Band, a Belief System and a Business.”  In concert, it quickly becomes clear that performance, for YACHT, derives from art, but not in the annoying, pretentious, or esoteric sense. Think Banksy, light on the politics. While there remains something obviously tongue-in-cheek about the whole endeavor, Bechtolt clearly feels very passionate about what he has created, and wants nothing more than to share it. 

Backed by two-man opening act Bobby Birdman on bass and drums, YACHT’s performance struck gold with a combination of serious eccentricities, quirky exuberance, and faithful interpretation of 2009’s critically acclaimed See Mystery Lights, the first album to feature Claire Evans as an official band member.

As the other half of Team YACHT, Evans truly nails her role as Bechtolt’s female counterpart. Imagine if Karen O and Siouxsie Sioux somehow conceived a child that came out looking like Annie Lennox from Eurythmics.  With a blonde bob, ruby red lips, and skintight black dress, the heron-like Evans is a gothified diva who bounced around the stage like a curious puppy, tapping on everyone else’s instruments, tipping over microphone stands and tangling herself up in wires. 

Compared to their studio work, nearly everything YACHT played sounded better live, from the jaunty, rattling anthem “The Afterlife” to the T-Pain-spoofing  auto-tune of “I’m In Love with a Ripper.”  Evans breathed unprecedented life into “It’s Boring/You Can Live Anywhere You Want,” a double-track that felt a little, well, boring in its 9-minute studio cut.  In addition, Bechtolt led a rollicking, electrified cover of L.A. band X’s garage-punk oldie “Nausea.”

Then there was near-flawless feel-good masterpiece “Psychic City,” the buoyant and bubbling little gem that proffers the delightful idea of a “voodoo city/where every little thing has its own secret life.” I must mention that this is one of my personal favorite songs—which is probably the only reason I noticed that Evans messed up the lyrics of the first verse—but other than that I was very pleased with the performance. They got all the “HUH!”s just right.

Never even needing to look at each other, the chemistry between Bechtolt and Evans thrives on the power of minimalism.  The two are clearly on the same wavelength, shining in small moments of almost familial synchronicity, such as their pokerfaced Macarena entrance, performed to the twittering pulsations of “Ring the Bell,” which provocatively chants “Will we go to heaven/Or will we go to hell/It’s my understanding/That neither are real” before dissolving into Three 6 Mafia-esque stutter effects. With Bechtolt in a white suit and white sneakers and Evans in head-to-toe black, a kind of yin/yang duality comes into play: together, they form a perfectly balanced whole and prove that on YACHT’s stage, there is room for two divas.

Unafraid to ham it up or break into spastic little dances, Bechtolt kept the energy high throughout the performance, basking in various forms of audience interaction.  There was a Q&A session, introduced with the promise, “We’ll answer anything!” (Q: “Why are you awesome?” A: “Why am I a mirror reflecting your awesomeness?”), and even a “guided meditation” in which he came down into the crowd on bended knee; “the world may end in my lifetime but my energy will continue,” Bechtolt intoned, “I will love. I will not attack.”

As the band’s website proclaims, “All people are welcome to become members of YACHT.  Accordingly YACHT is and always will be what YACHT is when YACHT is standing before you.”  So what is YACHT when YACHT is standing before you?  To put it simply: a damn good time.

Review by Hilary Cadigan