I Heard a Rumor...

It's no secret that I'm a big fan of the Rumor mini-festivals that happen at random intervals here in Utrecht, so of course I jumped at the opportunity to see the 47^th edition thereof. There was a complication, though: the biggest band involved, Grizzly Bear, got robbed a few days before and cancelled their entire tour, so they failed to appear. However, there was an intriguing-sounding replacement, so I went without hesitation, and I was even more glad than usual that I went.

The night began at Theater Kikker with a pair of modern classical pieces performed by the LOOS ensemble. Now, I'm normally pretty ambivalent to modern classical, in that I appreciate the composition and musicianship, but it never really grabs me. This time was a bit different, though – the piece was more enjoyable to me than most, primarily because of the instrumentation involved. Both pieces included significant amounts of percussion, with the second involving drums, glockenspiel, and a wooden xylophone in addition to bells – and I, being a percussion junkie, loved it. It still didn't quite connect the way other types of music do, but it was a considerably more enjoyable modern classical performance than most I've seen.

Next up was a trip to Rasa for what turned out to be the most interesting act of the night. Susie Ibarra, a Filipino composer, played a number of pieces from her current project, Electric Kulingtang, which consists of a fusion of traditional Filipino music, led by the namesake instrument, which is a sort of xylophone-esque series of differently pitched cup-shaped cymbals, with funk-jazz drumming and trancey electronics. The result was an ethereal yet rhythmic, hypnotic yet funky soundscape made unique by the rather beautiful sounds of the kulingtang. She was joined by drummer Roberto Rodriguez, who played both a jazz drum kit and a gome-like frame drum, both in full funk-jazz style. There were a couple songs where Ibarra switched to a wood-block vibraphone, and a dreamy keyboard number, but those simply didn't stand up to the kulingtang pieces which were the mainstay of the set. The unique mix of sounds made for a very compelling listen, and I'm a bit sad I couldn't afford the associated CD.

Thirdly was the replacement for Grizzly Bear, over at EKKO. It turned out to be Mohammed “Jimmy” Mohammed, a blind Ethiopian jazz singer. He was joined by two fellow Ethiopians he was touring with, along with two locals. All in all, his ensemble consisted of a pair of clay Ethiopian drums with a rich, deep sound, a lyre-like instrument amplified so that it sounded oddly similar to an electric piano, an oddly set up drum set (with a leather-bound tom instead of a bass drum, and a very large drum hanging from the ceiling, plus a frame-based shaker next to it), and a horn player alternating between sax, melodica, and bass clarinet. Their style could best be described as avantgarde afrobeat – think Fela Kuti with random bursts of Thelonius Monk, all permeated by “Jimmy”'s oddly nasal voice. It was a very lively, exceedingly energetic performance, and certainly the most fun of the shows at this Rumor. They even played the first encore I've seen at a Rumor. I'm not too familiar with Grizzly Bear, but I doubt they would have been as good.

Last was the weirdest act of this Rumor. Sir Alice, a young French woman, put on a bizarre audio/visual cabaret at SJU, going through such a dizzying array of disjointed parts that it's really rather difficult to concretely describe her act. Basically, she put on a weird show with strange caricatured images and disjointed electronic music, all designed to be very provocative. It was intense; the sort of thing you have to witness to have any chance to understand – and it still left me befuddled, in a good way.

Overall, this was an extremely good Rumor; most that I've been to have had a couple decent acts and one incredible one, while this one had three very good acts and one good one. On average, this one probably has the best overall quality, and there wasn't a single relatively weak act. That's how such things should be.

And Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside Out

Thursday's show was the one I'd been waiting for for quite some time, the one I'd had tickets sitting around for for nearly two months, the on for which I had to find an additional attendee since Tim bought one too many tickets: Yo La Tengo. I was pretty excited to see them, since I've been enjoying their music quite avidly for a while now. The thing that concerned me was what side of them would show. Yo La Tengo has a few modes, with the two most prevalent being the soft, atmospheric vibe of much of their more recent output and the oddly laid-back noise of their early stuff. Needless to say, I'm an aficionado of the abrasive yet soothing early material, so when I listened to the new album I was a little worried by the predominance of the softer tones there. As luck would have it, I found that my fears were hardly justified – and Adam, who prefers the other side of Yo La Tengo, had his fill of “his Yo La Tengo” too.

The first noticeable thing when Yo La Tengo took the stage was their odd stage presence – despit their subdued air, which was heightened by Ira Kaplan starting behind a keyboard and James McNew being seated facing ¾ away from the audience, they still had an easy charisma. It seems to have something to do with the air of comfort they exude – they seem to always know what one another are doing, and every one of them plays any given instrument (each band member played every available instrument over the course of the night, except that Georgia Hubley didn't play bass). Further, the little bit of banter they had with the audience was remarkable down-to-earth and friendly, adding to the placid, easygoing projection. Their music took on some of the same qualities, but went far beyond. While there was plenty of presence from the quiet atmospheric side of things, the noisy, improvisational tracks really carried the show. This became readily apparent as soon as they got to the opening track off their new album, “Pass The Hatchet, I Think I'm Goodkind”, a 10-minute mess with exactly two bars of bassline repeated over and over under increasingly wild guitarwork. It was simply stunning, and I was a bit amazed McNew didn't show any signs of boredom after ten minutes of the same two bars. The excellence went on throughout the long set, which was structured to stay in style for a bit, then flow to the next. They began mellow, cranked up the noise for a few songs, then played a long mellow interlude before using the absolutely perfect “Sugarcube” to transition into a final noise segment, including two lengthy, chaotic jams that were the highlight of the show. They rounded off with a chill encore, followed by a second encore of a rousing cover of the Silver Jews' “Bad Politics” and what they claimed was a doo-wop number by Sun Ra, though I was a bit incredulous. Regardless, it was a truly great show.

Setlist:

Let's Save Tony Orlando's House

I Should Have Known Better

Pass The Hatchet, I think I'm Goodkind

Stockholm Syndrome

Sometimes I Don't Get You

The Weakest Part

Beanbag Chair

Mr. Tough

I Feel Like Going Home

Nowhere Near

Sugarcube

Artificial Heart

Watch Out For Me Ronnie

The Story of Yo La Tengo

I Heard You Looking

Encore 1:

(not written down, included "Autumn Sweater")

Encore 2:

Bad Politics

?

Blues for Godzilla

It's been a busy week for shows, and I'm behind here goes the first of three reviews.

On Tuesday, I headed over to Tivoli de Helling to see the BellRays, who are best described as “rock 'n' soul”, or by analogy as Aretha Franklin fronting the MC5. More on them later. First off were the Flash Express, who were trying their best to actually be the MC5 – fast, loud, angry garage rock with with howling vocals. They did a pretty decent job of imitation, though, with a lot of energy, fun songs, and a frontman who did a very good impression of Rob Tyner, down to the scream-howls at certain points. They were fairly unremarkable, though, as they did little but ape the MC5, even if they did that well. They still managed to be a fun opening band.

As the BellRays took the stage, I found myself in the presence of the largest Afro I'd ever seen in person. Lisa Kekaula, the owner of that Afro, is what makes the BellRays so unique: they're an energetic garage rock bend fronted by a large black woman with an enormous Afro, with the sort of vocal style you'd expect from that description: soulful and powerful. She also has a simply great voice. She was of course the star of the night, from the kick-off with a simple “we are the BellRays...” to the last moments of the show. Her voice works rather well in combination with the rest of the band's sound – it's not what you'd normally expect with gritty, bluesy MC5 rock, but the combined effect is extremely enjoyable. Basically, their set was raucous and incredibly fun, even when they slowed down to play some more funk-laced numbers, and it put me in a very good mood for bartending later that night.

On the US midterm elections...

I think this sums it up quite well.

Ghiwale Jazz

A quick blurb on the show I saw on friday, to put me up to speed. They were a Moroccan jazz ensemble, and played a mix of classic jazz and traditional Moroccan music, with a guitar, drums, standup bass, keys, two singers/hand-drum players, a guy on two clay tom-toms, and a wind instrumentalist alternating between sax, flute, and a brassy clarinet-type thing. The music was quite good, though it was a litle bipolar in that it usually sounded really jazzy or really Moroccan rather than a fusion. I also found the constitution of the band quite interesting. The guitarist, who was the most charismatic of them, was in a wheelchair but played some pretty excellent guitar, which I really respect. There were several white guys among the mainly Moroccan band, which was good. And one of the singers/drummers looked like the stereotypical shoarma chef - balding, moustached, with a white shirt and black pants/shoes - which was highly endearing. It was an enjoyable show all in all.

Rumor 0 Summary

Here's a quick write-up of last sunday's Rumor, which was a free matinee-type thing due to it being a big cultural sunday.

First off, at Ekko, were Spires That In The Sunset Rise, an all-female free-folk band from Chicago. They played an odd mix of string instruments in a with a psychedelic vibe to it, including guitars, a banjo (played with a bow?), cello, and some exotic instruments which are apparently called mbira and bul bul tarang. They were extremely intriguing, and I really liked the music, but the vocals were a bit questionable at times. Still very good. Interesting fact: I noticed at least five small children (under 8) there. I wonder what they made of it?

Second was a trip to Theater Kikker to see "Co-Incidents", a dance/music piece by someone whose name I can't recall or find right now. It was basically four things: a trumpet player, an electronic music manipulater, an interpretive dancer of sorts, and bizarre lights. The music was novel, the dance was odd, and the lights were mesmerizing. All in all, I wasn't sure what to make of this, but the lights sure were cool.

Lastly, we went to SJU to see Brown Vs Brown, who Tim and I had missed out on at Rumor. They proved to be a wild funky noise jazz band. They ended up spunding like a cross between the Minutemen and the Flying Luttenbachers to me, which was certainly a good thing. Their sax/guitar/drums/bass lineup put out an impressive wall of sound while still managing an incredibly intricate rhythm. They were definitely the highlight of this Rumor.

All in all, a good Rumor, and a great free show.

Samiam/The Draft, 2 weeks later

Samiam/The Draft, live in Utrecht @ Tivoli de Helling, October 23 2006

I have a confession: I was never a big Hot Water Music fan. While I appreciated them, I never reached the level of veneration they seem to enjoy at punknews.org, and I've barely listened to their successor band, the Draft, at all. I also never got into Samiam that much, even though they seem to be the favourite band of the scene here in Utrecht, judging by buttons alone. Still, I enjoy both bands enough that the choice of whether or not to see them for a low price in a nearby venue was a rather easy one, and my rather ambivalent expectations were far exceeded by both groups.

Opening the night were Note To Amy, a local hardcore group who seemed to fit the style of the night pretty well. To a large extent, they played standard clean-vocals hardcore with all the standard trappings, but sported a significant Hot Water Music-esque emocore slant to their sound. Their set was decent enough, but pretty unremarkable other than the fact that their vocalist had a rather good voice. Still, they were decent if not exciting. The same can't be said of The Draft, who were up next. Though there was little obvious reaction from the typically restrained Dutch crowd, there was still a palpable air of excitement when they took the stage, and little encouragement was needed to get the crowd to move all the way forward (though a hole was left in front of Chris Wollard, prompting him to wonder several times if he stank). The band, after a short introduction and a “we hope you have as much fun as we do”, went straight into “New Eyes Open”, the start of a great set. They proceeded with energy and gusto, going through about nine songs within forty minutes. They were fairly focussed on the music, stopping only to make a few remarks on such subjects as Epitath and Gainesville; nothing interesting enough to repeat, really. But the music was well worth the focus – having listened to In a Million Pieces only a couple of times, I was amazed by the quality of the song I hadn't let sink in. The Draft are indeed a lot more melodic than their predecessor, but that doesn't detract at all from their intensity – they put on a very powerful, energetic and downright enjoyable show. I didn't get the setlist, but I know they played “Let It Go”, “Bordering”, “Longshot” and “Lo Zee Rose” (the closer) as well as the aforementioned “New Eyes Open”.

After the Draft went offstage, the scene was set for Samiam. By this time, the crowd was in full swing (or as much as can be expected from a Dutch audience, which wasn't really that much), so it was definitely a good thing that they took to the stage quickly and started with relatively little complication, though Jason Beebout made a pause to yell “Hello Czechoslovakia”, which got a bit less reaction than it warranted. They didn't hesitate before bursting out with “Sunshine”. The obvious instinct then was to compare them with the Draft, what with them being right after one another and playing fairly similar styles. There was a fairly marked sense of differentiation between the two, which boiled down to the Draft being more energetic and aggressive, while Samiam were more melodic and emotive – basically, Samiam felt more mature. That doesn't mean they lacked energy or force, though – their set was captivatingly intense from start to finish, as they went through 14 songs with even less of a pause than the Draft had given. There weren't reallt any interesting antics or happenings to report, just a good solid set, including such standouts as an exceptionally desperate-sounding “Mud Hill” and of course the only charting single Samiam released, “Capsized”. The band was fairly static throughout, unfortunately, so the kinetic energy of the set was a bit lower than it could have been. One of the better moments of the show came when the time came for their encore, when Johnny Cruz came out alone, prompting Draft drummer George Rebelo to yell “Drum solo!” from the audience, at which point Jeremy Bergo, who had joined Cruz on the stage, grumbled “no one asks for a bass solo...” Alas, no solo was forthcoming, only a three-song encore. It still provided a good end to a good show.

Samiam setlist:

Sunshine

Factory

Bad Day

She Found You

Mud Hill

Get It Right

Come Home

Stepson

No Size That Small

Take Care

Capsized

Mexico

Dull

Full On

Encore:

When We're Together

Wisconsin

Super Brava