Man Is Man

I went to see Man Is Man at Hideout on a Thursday. The week before Christa's new band played to an noisy Whistler. I love Whistler, but more than a few times it devolves into a hipster cafeteria without the food. I can hear people chatting over the performer. For that night it was just her with autoharp and the cello player. At the Hideout with a crowd more attentive, less chatty there was a full band. It was clear that the mid-porous crowd was there for her. I arrived somewhere in the second or third song. This was supposed to be a record release thing but I do not recall anything at the merch table. Those Birds Will Eat Us is the debut CD. But I could not get it and so my impressions will be sparked by the live show...my memory of it, and the youtube videos she posts up. There are only so many people that can make sad, dark places sound as cool as Man Is Man. Very few have that cathartic payoff sustained. Man Is Man walks as your tour guide through the darker rooms of the mind, the interior castle you refuse to enter. And it's not about glamming up the sadness, to make it worse but the survival of it. Perhaps this is a sentiment that I carry over from her Puerto Muerto days, there is an affinity to the primitive, to what's on the frontier. Music for the lonely campfire, the log cabin. So perhaps it's no wonder that Christa would write about animals. Nick Cave weeps but not for very long and neither does Christa. I think that's because she closes that back door to the feeling of vulnerability. And that's the enduring strength.

Zig

Walking Bicycles

A lot of baggage I bestowed on this band that perhaps have nothing to do with the music itself yet still influential on the imprint. There is an influence that has more to do with how I arrange furniture in the head. Pre-Recession was when I was re-discovering the local scene and Empty Bottle. Going to England for the familiar but expensive Whitby Gothic Weekend was now impossible. Fresh from discovering Queen Adreena abroad. I was craving for what I can discover locally....what a novelty. Fresh from the wonder of walking past a threshold I see Walking Bicycles. I saw them three times and every performance was at Empty Bottle. Seeing them was not easy. Each time felt like I stole a much treasured moment from The Man. Or there was something off about when these great performances presented themselves, like on a Free Monday, or a Saturday. How often are Mondays awesome! There was always an obstacle to overcome that made seeing Walking Bicycles so prohibitive and irresistible an accomplishment, almost missed and so iconic to me. The second time was the hardest. The third was for the CD release of GO? in December 2008. They have been around I think since 2004 and here I am barely aware of them in 2007. So even if their music have nothing to do with the then incoming bursting of the great bubble, it felt like they saw it coming. Welcome To The Future was the great announcement. Exactly the dark and bouncy post-punk I needed after knowing Katie Jane Garside abroad. Jocelyn the lead singer was so damn cool off-stage as well. We both know Scary Lady Sarah. That was funny to me. Sarah already knew of them well before my own discovery. Sarah 9.5 out of 10 will know of the music before I do. I would run into Jocelyn at the Bottle on some occasions, and always so cool. I was always afraid she would not remember me. You don't want to just drop from the celling and expect to be recognized....well you do. It's just awkward when it does not work. Now they are recording their 4th album and they got a facebook page. So the band still lives, and I'm very happy about that. Welcome back y'all, to me you never really left. This last picture is one outside the Bottle with the bass player.

Fielded

Lindsey Powell as Fielded played Chicago ...... on some infernally cold Saturday to a packed and warm Crown Tap Bar on the north side. Lindsey is tiny and so it was best to be in front. I arrived well ahead of her set. There was even enough time for her to go to the bathroom. A lot of what I get from this band for the moment I can only get live.....and preserved on youtube I only recently discovered. In one of the videos she waves around a light-saber in the garage, and sings while cradling a dog in her arms. A veil of snow settles on them both. Cute, right?
Anyway, Terrorgeist is the vinyl release that I still have not bought yet. So all my impressions have a built in distance. But each performance leaves it's own stamp. Some are memorable for the novelty of where, like the one at some DIY venue in the dangerous south-side....Well yeah, near 26th st. It counts. It was cool, you can smoke everywhere and can just chill on both roofs.....anyway I'm veering off. I think she's going to move to L. A., bummer.
Ms Lindsey is in all kinds of projects that are great and each with a separate depth of mystery. I find her fascinating the more I research her. She is in Ga'an, Festival as well as Fielded, and is well traveled with them all. These are all very different animals from each other and Fielded is but one side to Lindsey Powell. This is perhaps the fifth time I see her in some capacity. I see her now so I can remember her shows in other iconic moments like at this old factory-turned venue on the south-side. Her primary instrument is her voice that she loops together into a chorus, and tweeks to sound deeper. Sometimes Lindsey uses two mics. Not this time. It's not just about what your voice is doing at the present moment but what else you can make it do at the same time. There is a lot that she demands of herself in this capacity.

The voice is another flexible instrument. Her music if ambient....when ambient, is also tense and suspenseful, and apparent when you see her sweat, outstretched hand and closed eyes. This is not something that is delivered casually. So how can this be of interest to goth culture? Well, she's weird and dark, and you can dance to her music. Do you remember how it felt to hear Zola Jesus the first time? Minimally electronic and organic. Her dark choral chants are trance inducing, and she takes her time in doing them. This is music that is not intended for the short attention-span. Yeah, she has her pagan chanting down. I think this is an easy sell to a goth crowd. It's the kind of weirdness we like to dance to. For those that like Zola Jesus, go see Fielded. At the very least you will find better parking I remember once reading about Fielded. They described her music as gospel. I can see that in this passionate delivery. She takes her time in assembling her songs, for this crowd that's OK. They seemed attentive. Her songs that I recall most easily "White Death" and "Another Time". But there is a lot that she plays that I'm familiar with but cannot name. . Lindsey adjusts and tweaks her instruments as she finds that moment when she can just close her eyes and be taken by her performance. Finally, this post is done.

Early January

Magic Key when they performed outdoors near Logan Square.
These are of Rebecca Scott the lead singer of Panda Riot.

This Thursday 5th January I'm aiming to see Magic Key play Hideout with Panda Riot. They seem to be at different ends of this faerie world I put them, individual relationships with it. They play a lot. I've seen them both at Empty Bottle and Whistler. They evolve faster than their CD output suggests. Recording costs money. So it's important to see them live. The organic machinery that can keep them going is still going to be the people that see them. P R is mid-tempo dream pop expresses sentiments one can only be felt in relaxed moments. You're gonna stop to take a breath to say you're happy just to exist. So their relaxed but do not just drift. They are the kind of shoegaze we dance to at Latebar. They play a lot locally. They just signed to a new small local label XD Records. Magic Key is dark, and serious as a heart attack dramatic. Keyboard driven dark and colorful and just as worthy of a goth-themed dance floor. They seem to have this heavy serious authority normally expected in classical music. Perhaps it may sound like I'm too much hyping this up, but it's rare to have something that normally just plays in your head suddenly share a real stage.

Cross Record

I caught a part of the Cross Record show, and afterwards I got the CD which is actually two separate EP's, Magnetic Current, and Ring Bell. So the following will be about hearing this later. I'm really digging this band. They mostly remind me of another local act Bone And Bell, and Festival, a band fronted by Ms Fielded herself Lindsey Powell. Ms Emily Cross even plays the uke, which superimposes a beach, a shell to hear the ocean through. You see through the vague nostalgic glass with in a volcano. The names of the songs are also quite precious. You can go into deep thought with this music, but with the suspense of what is beyond the fog. Dense with tension, mystery and innocent sweetness like a Kate Jane Garside satellite project. Call me a snob but for me it would be the lesser of us that don't appreciate this band cross record. I seriously need to lay off black cat. It's like the Fielded side project Festival. Love that song. These powerful and influential first impressions don't often carry the burden of analysis. Now I'm devouring holy well. The music of this band is like a vineyard. It will yield well over time, that's not saying that I'm not into it now. I'm really digging this now. Ms Emily's voice is clear, and so listening to lyrics will reveal more bends in the maze. I mention only Emily but there on more musicians in the band as the pictures show. There is more I can say about this band but I just need to post this how. Oh and They will play The Hungry Brain again this 9th January, Yay!!

The Sentinels

As late as 8pm Saturday 17 December I did not know that in a matter of hours I would be at Pancho's in the audience seeing this local band The Sentinels. I had given up on the remote possibility of any such highlight. Nothing was on my radar, as I meandered around the internet. I may have ran into the name of the band before, but only now did the convergence of many separate moments ignite the urgency to go see them. Somehow I look up Pancho's and with hours I'm standing on one side watching their gig, some brain cells hold a constant vigil on the thought of how easily I could have missed it still at home or worse possibly becoming aware of the show after it's done. So I'm so happy to have not missed this. The Sentinels are fronted by Liz Elle. Music Of The Pleistoscene, is the CD. Generally speaking they got the heaviness and intensity of say between Shirley Manson pre-Garbage and Melissa Auf Dumar. Say I change my mind 'cause describing them is still a moving picture. Naming the two bands and including The Sentinels in the same thought says they got the indy rock coolness to merit a listen. They saved me from the fog of boredom. Liz voice is light womanly. It's not deep like Ana Calvi. On stage Ms Liz does not go ape-shit crazy like Jilly from We Are Hex. She was coolly dressed like it was open mic poetry at Weeds on a Monday night. It was the hat. It was the shirt. And so you look at her like she has something to say, not just sing. I'm still in the struggle as to how to describe them but I can say that I like Meadow Of Darkness. The acoustic guitar is flowery like All About Eve. The songs are not sedate but their charm is less obvious than in the other artists mentioned. Give them the time and the picture sharpens. Saracen Smile is a long but scenic journey, not slow, but one that I will take my time discovering. It's like two songs. See how the music soaks long term. I struggle with how I would best introduce them, live or on CD in the car. I don't recall which songs I saw live. The foggy memory of discovery does not recall which songs I heard live. I see them live with several different lenses, one just enjoys the visual, the moment. The other documents and packs as much into the moment to enjoy later. Sometimes I'm too busy documenting to analyze what I'm documenting. First time and listening to the music later are separate moments that reinforce each other. To name them is still because I heard them later on my own time. I will return to them with more time spent listening. For now I'm in that stage of early discovery of something cool. And this enthusiasm leads me to post up pictures.

Moritat

I arrived too late to really see them last Sunday 6 November. But I saw them at Quenchers not too long before. Moritat is one of those bands I see in the context of a longer narrative, and from there in the context of a wider Chicago scene. One episode in a longer evolution, in a chain mail of other stories. Changes you see from the observance of more than two performances. It's a compulsion of mine, that helps to better document in the footnotes what went on in Chicago, around Chicago, and what went on with me. In observing them, and writing about them I document a fleeting delicate music scene and my self exploration as by-product.

Venus plays guitar! Her comfort is in the keyboard. She used to be the exclusive voice, and now it's pretty much everyone. Their trip hop sound is relaxed and casual but alert like a boxer. Betrays no stress but is not boring. The two tangible CDs that are available from them are One Minute Fade, their latest. But they first appeared on my radar with Yellow House which they had for free. The title song and Noise are the songs that best display this relaxation that still build tension and interest in this tension. They are writing and performing new music. And did I say they are making Venus play guitar. When Venus hits the keys it's with no cathartic display. I've seen keyboardists that seem to still be working things out, hammering the keys or reading the stress on their faces. It's not like that with Venus. Yet songs like have that sneaky urgency of a faster assembly line. I've described other stuff as trip hop like Panda Riot but Moritat seem miles away from airy faerie shoegaze. What registers as trip hop does so cleanly away. Moritat feel more like creatures of this world, familiar. Another cool by-product is the bands you meet through .....the bands you met. A casual suggestion from Venus had me stay to see The Eternals! I always see Julie Meckler at Moritat shows. If Venus is on stage, Julie is on the floor. They support each other. Julie is all kinds of awesome. She performed and I was well and on time for that.