Great American Music Hall
June 19, 2001
Photos
Review by Squid
Jesus Christ. We knew this show was going to be good, but we didn't know it was going to be INSANE with diversity. Insane as in a full-on gorgeous clusterfuck of jazz, breakbeats, jungle, techno, ambience and even a tiny pinch of punkrock all in one show. The core was still the post-techno beats created almost a decade ago by founding partners Jan St. Werner and Andi Toma, but there was never a pause as they set their melodic loops through a seamless onslaught of (live) breaks, thumping funk basslines, and ridiculously crisp samples. All played in real time, with the sporadic assistance of (and here Squid would like to make sure no one misses this) only ONE laptop. One. Sitting astride the drumkit in dominance of this scenario was the amazing Dodo Nkishi, a man who looked like Jimi Hendrix in a pair of Teva sandals and played with the timing, ferocity, and precision of all the heroes you're too young to have seen. As if that wasn't enough, he also delivered vocals that ranged from soft lullabies to punk shoutdowns. "Wait", screamed Squid at Karilyn, "He's getting all polyrhythmic and shit, and now he's going to sing too?!" As if that weren't enough, the encore was a mindblowing 'around the genres in 80 seconds' that started as a headtrip gamelanish weedhaze a la Gong, gained booty and became dub, sped up to a throbbing funkspeed, tripped over itself to become slick dancehall, and suddenly went triple-time and became a Brazilian samba carnaval that had people pogoing up and down and Squid wide-eyed in shock and Josh shaking his head in disbelief shouting, "What the...where the FUCK did that come from?!". Ladies and gentleman, this show was so sick with it that Daz refused to be driven home and instead ensconced herself back in line for the second 10:30pm show. She wasn't sorry. They opened the second show with a number that Daz describes as "loud guitar, heavy drums, that had kind of a heavy metal head-banging feel".
Mouse on Mars have set a high standard for all electronica shows to come, at least for us. They proved that this sort of music can in fact be driven by the talent and skill of musicians playing complex electronic compositions live. Sure, perhaps MoM have the financial opportunities that other acts from this genre lack, but they still knocked out the best show of the year with only three people and standard modern equipment. Squid has always maintained that electronic shows sometimes demand more intricate treatment than two dudes with their laptops, and this gig proves it.
Sonna are an instrumental collective from Baltimore whose music fall somewhere between the guitar voicings of Tristeza and the reiterative melodic style of local heroes Tarentel. It comes as no surprise then that Tarentel's label Temporary Residence was in fact founded by Sonna member of Jeremy Devine. Karilyn really enjoyed it and picked up their album, "We Sing Loud Sing Soft Tonight" on her way out. Vert, the opener for the second set was an ambient one man laptop operation. Daz didn't feeling as though she could fully appreciate what he was going for since the GAMH closed the upstairs for the second show and all attendees were packed into the downstairs and chatting loudly. Learn about Vert's new album, "Nine Types of Ambiguity" and his other releases at Sonig.
Sonna
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Mouse on Mars
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