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with Matmos Paramount Theater, Oakland October 17th, 2001 Reviewed by Janet Flemer The Paramount is so beautiful, if you haven't been there they have movies on Friday nights (with a full bar!) and also they have tours. Carved gilt Art Deco on every surface. Luxe, luxe, luxe. Unfortunately it's now a Clear Channel venue so who knows if the movies will continue or even the good shows they have every couple of years. You knew every song we hear on commercial radio and every show practically everywhere is being controlled by this evil octopus, right? Not sure what we can do about it, but I guess it's pretty small potatoes compared to Ebola and all. It's also designed for primo people watching, with alcoves and balconies and a wonderful porthole on the top floor. The kids went all out for their Icelandic princess. Mostly the girls; I saw two who had a bunch of twigs and leaves stuck in their hair, there was lots of glitter and masky eye shadow, and one had a copy of the famous swan dress from the Academy awards. Even my mum knew who Björk was after that broadcast. The stage floor was covered with a huge white tarp, and even the monitors had been covered with white. There was a platform over on the right, also covered in white, for Matmos' equipment. There were also white lamp-posts curving over each corner of the platform. Matmos got a pretty gigantic response being locals. Their sound was really interesting but some of the video images they were projecting made me feel queasy. Closeups of hairy flesh, I mean very close-up, and a trip down an orifice I didn't really want identified. I opted for the bar, or rather lots of standing in lines to either ingest fluids or expel them. Finally the lights went down for Björk. The place went insane. There was a full goddam orchestra in the orchestra pit. They played the overture for "Dancer in the Dark", all French horns and melancholy and we all started crying. I'm projecting. One spotlight, which seemed like it was supposed to be illuminating falling confetti, and our girl sitting on a stool, apparently playing some sort of instrument that looked translucent and sounded sort of plinky, like a xylophone. Then Matmos, a harpist, a girl's chorus dressed in red and decorative Inuit poncho things came out. I won't be able to tell you what songs were played in what order, I have Vespertine and am even playing it right now, but I was overwhelmed. I can't even imagine what it would be like to have all these musicians doing what you want, and having it turn out so amazingly well. Just the combination of the orchestra, the chorus, the harpist and Matmos is probably making you think it couldn't possibly work, but it did. The harpist also played some keyboards (one of them an ancient-sounding pump organ that reminded me of one that was in a house my family used to rent on Chappaquidick when I was little) and there was a very bizarre-looking triangular shaped instrument too but she mostly played the harp. I'm sure you want to know what Björk was wearing. For the first part, when she was playing mostly Vespertine material, she had what looked like part of the swan dress on, with a bodice encrusted in pearls and bare feet. Also turquoise masky eye shadow, which the girls in the audience must have known about. There was an intermission, during which some people apparently saw Tom Waits ( I didn't) and some lucky kids standing outside all forlorn got free tickets handed to them by a benevolent music biz person. For the second part she wore a red sparkly dress, the bottom part of which, made of huge red feathers, reminded my benefactor of one of those wooden birds from the 70's that tipped up and down like they were drinking water. There's definitely some birdie stuff going on with Björk, she and Brad Mossman should get together. The stage was wearing much brighter lights, green and pink and purple. Bright red for "Army of Me" from Post, which was incredible. I haven't mentioned her voice, have I? She really unleashed it during the second half. There's totally nothing else out there like it. The orchestra conductor was completely rocking out. During this half she also did "I've seen it All", from Selma Songs, and more stuff from Post, and a new song with everyone clapping. She ran around like a child, again in bare feet. The woman's a force of nature, I can't really say any more. Totally awe-inspiring. ok bye Janet |