Circuit Des Yeux

Friday 10 August I convinced Greg to go with me to Empty Bottle. We got there on time to see Ruby Fray before them. They deserve their separate posts. Circuit Des Yeux is miss Haley Fohr on guitar....mostly. I don't think she's twenty three yet and her music has this old timey feel to it. At the time of this performance she was a few days into moving to live in Chicago from Lafayette, Indiana. She started the band in High School. Haley sounds deep and old. Her music sounds to me like it would come from someone older. This somehow speaks to me as from a contemporary or elder. It would not be a surprise if she somehow stood out of her age-peers. We Are Hex are from Indiana. I cannot help but wonder if they speak from a similar urban experience or at least....I bring that up because when I like bands I'm always curious about where they're from and how environment influenced the music.  They sound nothing alike of course, Hex and Yeux. I know it's like using the telescope backwards, but that also works too. You ask different questions that way. It makes you extra curious of where they are from.
  It always impresses me to see the artist go it alone like her. You have the full band and you share and delude the tension of having eyes on you. I've seen awesome performers lose the crowd to ipods and such.  There is a lot to distract. And I think you need to not have a short attention span especially for her. Her songs mesmerize and then the weirdness stays with you. But I can see her music having to slow a burn for most younger attention spans..She leans more 21+ than all-ages. I remember her set was loud as hell. At this point for me to say "this is dark...that's dark". Dark barely gets me out of the couch. Everything I go to is dark or I stay on my ass. You look at these pictures and you don't think this "chick" can go loud, right? Haley will blow your ear drums out while putting you in a trance. You are taken by the gentle but loud influence of guitar drones. Swirls of repetition that keep you in orbit. A CDY song is tense like anticipating a truck slowly from around the corner of a mountain road in IRC....Ice Road Truckers?....in Peru? Thats right I only go out some of the time. So there is weirdness and tension. I say weird to describe to the outside what speaks to me on the inside. To me CDY is cool and somehow represented by it. Some of the segments Much of what I had to say about Ruby Fray I can also say here. You are just overwhelmed with her intensity. The people that go it alone on stage always fascinate me. They are the bravest of performers. Twenty and Dry from the album Portrait seems to put you in the moment before committing to an action of extreme consequence. The edge of deep contemplation and in-the-moment intensity. I'm glad she moved here. I can't wait to eventually have the long take of her music and buy the shirt. Greg bought it already. The picture is way cool.
Zig