photo of PICTUREPLANE by Joseph Talmant
PICTUREPLANE is a one man producer from Denver, CO who makes fucked up and twisted gothic trance house music he has also done sick remixes for artists like HEALTH, CRYSTAL CASTLES, and a collaboration with Zach Condon from BEIRUT. It sounds real dirty and always breaks apart when you start to get a groove, but not enough for you to loose your groove entirely. For his live set he played synthesizer and a sampler over an iPod and sputtered indistinguishable delay soaked vocals. He was an odd one talking about post-human alien sex or something along those lines. I was excited for his set due to his bad ass full-length DARK RIFT and he delivered up to my excitement. He pulsed in and out of the groove at times but songs like "DAY GLOWWED" were a big bouncin' success. I jus wished more people were moving their feet, why stand in the front row if your not gonna let loose a little? Pictureplane is either going to become real tight figure in what he's doing or he'll just move on to something else, not sure what's gonna go down.
photo of SMALL BLACK by Joseph Talman
SMALL BLACK /// I won't lie I enjoy this thing called chillwave AKA glow-fi, and I guess you can go as far as saying that SMALL BLACK is a band that defines it. Them folks are from Brooklyn and the music they make is ultra happy and soaked with feelings of a good time. There was a minor issue regarding the vocalist not having power, so that stilted the beginning BUT as soon as they started people were to have fun. Although I always have the gripe about people not dancing at shows (Andy is also vehemently opposed to these people) I think that this set was accepting of head nodding and minimally grooving out, it is called chill-wave not rage-wave. Enough about the people, more about SMALL BLACK...everything they did blended together uniformly and I could almost hear tape hiss because of the wash they had over their music. The drummer was good///the keyboardist was good///the bass player was good///and the singer was on point...nothing was wrong with their music in any way to me. This allowed for a joyful time of moving around and was a very pleasant experience. Not to kill the mood, but thinking back about the set it wasn't a very exciting one. They sounded great and true to the studio material but I wasn't impressed by it To explain what I mean... I'm not reeling from the experience /// I have lingering fond feelings of delight. Which I think is what they want. I'm not really sure. They're definitely a band worth checking out.
photo of WASHED OUT is by Joseph Talman
WASHED OUT is Ernest Greene from Georgia and he is the perfect example of an amazing bedroom studio project who breaks out of the room and plays good shows. The music he makes is actually sometimes borrowed music for example his song "Feel It All Around" is actually the sampled "I Want You" by GARY LOW. That song in particular has already been sampled before! MISS KITTEN & THE HACKER did it with "The Beach" and SINEMA did it with "In My Eyes". What Ernest is doing isn't terribly original, artists like DAFT PUNK use almost entirely samples in their music. This type of material started as DJing and progressed to things like House music, and offshoots there of. That's why WASHED OUT's set came off as a DJ set because that's basically what he was doing. What he really puts into his music is the vocals. He really has his voice filling in all the gaps in the mix and even though I don't know most of the words I'm compelled to try and sing along especially with the long drawn out vowels. This time around people were starting to throw down and dance, I'm thinking because most of the people there were WASHED OUT fans and didn't really know the other two bands enough to dance. I didn't really feel any connection between me and the performer and it didn't really seem like he was performing to the audience. So I quickly started to pay much more attention to the music. Everything was in it's right place and his production was well mixed with his vocals, but it seemed like it was too structured. He would finish a song and say thank you then proceeded to get all his equipment set up and ready for the next song. It was missing that right there and ready flow of a band. Next thing I knew SMALL BLACK took the stage and joined him, a much needed affair.
photo of WASHED OUT + SMALL BLACK by Joseph Talman
The bigger feeling of performance came about and when they started the catchy thumbing bass line of "Feel It All Around" instantly securing the moment of the night, It was the song everyone knew and it was a joyous affair. After a few more songs I had had my fill and decided to leave the crowd and was prompted to do so when Mr. Mutherfucking Jersey Shore took his shirt off and decided rub his sweaty back on me. I left the dance floor and sat my sweaty ass down in the back of the Tea Bazaar still listening to the awesome music going on. Although the show was of the utmost fun. I think Tea Bazaar was, a bad venue choice. I think the space did take away from the performance a little bit. PICTUREPLANE felt right at home in the tea house but it was too crowded during most of the show. Josh from SMALL BLACK even said that he was used to being next to his band mates and that he wished the people in the back could see them as well. Although I could see everything fine, I'm sure that some people couldn't see a thing. BUT! the show was definitely not ruined because of it.
In retrospect of the show I've decided this...
PICTURE PLANE's live set isn't pictureperfect BUT it's fuckingbadass /// SMALL BLACK is better live than on record /// WASHED OUT is better on record than live (Until SMALL BLACK joins them then it's heavenly union)
After the show was through I headed over to the "after-party?" at Chloe/Steven/I don't know who else lives at the house's house. I found myself in the basement holding the batteries in a YAMAHA DD-7 drum pad while I beat the shit out of it. Around me were people playing music. Juan the bass player for SMALL BLACK joined in for a while, when we retired I watched people dance and fist pump, saw FREAKY LED HOOLA-HOOP DANCING, and had a philosophical chat about music with Jeff from SMALL BLACK. They seem like nice dude's.
Andy Dandy already covered the BIG A little a show, but I wanted to reiterate that it was FUKING AMAZING. Also I'm gonna keep an eye out for The Screen's because from what I experienced they were really great. I have a feeling they could be even better. because as Andy said they had just had a car accident and had to borrow most of their equipment.
P.S. What's up with this stuff I'm hearing about someone peeing in the potted plant near the stage at the Tea Bazaar... I'm fairly certain it's untrue. My friend Matt was standing next to it, and it looked like someone had spilled some beer onto the floor, then two dudes I'm assuming as a joke started yelling "He Peed in the Plant!" Matt later said something along the lines of "Someone peed in the potted plant? I would joke about doing that but props to the guy who did!"
LAUGH OUT LOUD I'm fairly certain it never happened. oh my.
Love,
/////////////// ///// / / / / / DYLAN \ \ \ \ \ \\\\\ \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\
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