It's been a busy week. I've shockingly been required to actually do stuff in work over the course of the past 7 days and my evenings have been split between watching Champions League semi-finals (about which I now officially don't give 2 fucks for the remainder of this season but I think it'd be hilarious after all he stick he's received this year if Grant masterminded a Chelsea victory) and practicing for what I'll be up to a week from tonight (atonal dirges FTW) so I've not had a chance to recap last weekend.
Saturday began upstairs in Whelan's for Phosphorescent's early gig. I've been talking up Matthew Houck a lot since a friend mentioned him to me a couple of months ago. The more I listen to his most recent album the more I've become enamoured with it. Live and solo Houck's songs become less ambient and spacey and take on a more folkish tinge and his haunting falsetto becomes something much more raw and seemed constantly on the verge of cracking in a really enticing way. Backed only by a loop pedal and his skills at doing overdubs Houck built his voice up into a choir on a couple of occasions to great effect. I enjoyed it a great deal but it was quite different from what I thought I'd be hearing. He's planning on returning to Ireland in July or August with a full band so hopefully when he does things will sound a little more similar to how they do on record.
Following that I headed down to Andrew's Lane Theatre (my first time there and a really nice venue, good sound if you're not right up the front and as such beyond the PA speakers but boo to toilet attendants) and arrived midway through Crayonsmith's set. I don't think I've ever, in all the many many times that I've seen them play (which is seemingly at at about 20% of every gig I've been at in the past year), enjoyed them as much as I did last Saturday. With the release of their new album they really seem to have upped their game and with an upcoming US tour with Islands in the coming months booked they could win some friends when they're over there.
But the main reason I was there ... Why?. Aside from the unsettling sight of Yoni Wolf playing drums whilst standing which is just entirely unnatural and wrong but something that I'll concede is more of a personal foible on my part pretty much the only complaint I have about the gig was the absence from the setlist of "Fatalist Palmestry" a.k.a. my favourite song of the year to date, everything else was brilliant. The set dipped pretty evenly into material from this year's Alopecia and earlier stuff which seemed to keep recent converts such as myself and long time devotees happy. Possibly the best gig I've been to this year but certainly the best crowd that I've been a part of in 2008. Quite different from the somewhat cowed audience at Sebadoh a few days earlier I doubt there was a moments silence the whole night. The band merely needed to stand around doing nothing for more than 10 seconds before the audience filled the void with cheers from all around the room.
Afterwards everyone I spoke to, be it other bloggers, promoters, ordinary Joe punters or band members remarked on how hot for Why? the audience had been. I think perhaps things have been a little subdued around Dublin of late because booking agents have figured out that they can book their bands in midweek slots in the city when they're on tour and they know that a crowd will show up. It occurs to me that I've not been to that many gigs by foreign bands on a Saturday recently and the fact that there was no work to go to for most attendees might have let them cut loose a little more. It certainly impressed the band as afterwards I heard Yoni Wolf say that thy were touring Europe again in October and would be telling their agent to make sure they're booked to play Ireland again when they are.
Sunday wasn't as music heavy with a much more manageable single gig to go to, the launch of So Cow's second album I'm Siding With My Captors in Anseo. Support was from Big Monster Love who at this point I've seen play about 8 times now. During his set I found myself considering and not for the first time just how good BML's songs are; funny, lovelorn with really nice but simple melodies and came to a conclusion about them. Brian Kelly then articulated the exact same thing that I'd concluded as he began his set which pisses me off a little as it makes me sound like I'm biting So Cow's shit but fuckit. No one in Ireland writes better songs than Big Monster Love does and anyone that has any sort of affection for the ultra lo-fi stylings of Daniel Johnson or Jeffrey Lewis really needs to make the effort to seek out his music. As for So Cow, Jesus does he like to talk, the gig seemed to me to be equal parts spoken word show incorporating a mid-set Q&A session and "nonsense punk". Despite how entertaining a racounteur Kelly is it's really when he plays his tunes that things take off. Using by an iPod for backing tracks he manages to overcome the general lameness of doing such a thing with ease by putting as much effort and energy into his set as most 4-pieces would and capped off a great weekend of music in the city perfectly. The album by the way is good. A little more raw than his previous ablum from last year (and so prolific is he that his next will be out in October), there's less interesting synth sounds but there's no end of spikey pop goodness on it.
Oh and on Monday night Arsenal bitchslapped Derby 6-2. It's hard to get excited about it.
Sunday, May 4, 2008
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