Treasurer

Just happened to catch this on a Free Monday at Empty Bottle that I did not know that morning I'd go. Treasurer already had me sold by the time they played their last song  Los Amigos  the last song I believe.  Its the one song I recall for sure they played that is on the CD. I've played it like its the first time repeatedly.  Its muscular like you just did more pull-ups than you thought you could. They were generous enough to just  give me their CD.  So for me the performance and the CD are almost two separate things tethered by one song. No matter. Their name......last week  it had only one meaning and it was not the name of a band I would like...a lot.  Now I'm all into Brochure, their 6 song EP. Singer's voice is chill, almost in a speaking tone and in stark contrast to the raging bass behind her. It works to invite hmm deeper thoughtful moments when slowed down like in Rural Geometry. The bass is what I noticed first. Its the only guitar they got. It just induces movement in your hips, as if they had better ears for it. Thats the id telling you something. The guy played it with an infectious enthusiasm. He played aggressively yet I can still hear the singer, she was not drowned out. The guy dripped sweat from his forehead. I imagine it was probably Venn that sold me first but I don't know. This is something I certainly would want to see again. You can tell where their songs sink into individual stretches like in a jam session. The Country Is Behind Me has the aggression of the bass give the girls voice this awesome background for her to strut. In none of these songs I know what is being spoken. The impressions here therefore are way fucking subjective and will evolve as the music finds its permanent space in the minds interior castle. I hope this is the first in many times to see them. Their music is sharp, messy, energetic with a calming almost whispering mysterious voice. You don't listen with you're ears as much as with the hips, the body. For me that's the bass in front. If this post strikes as short....well at least its not the usual long winded take.
Zig

Circuit Des Yeux at the MCA....and The Owl

Its not worth the effort to try to park near the Museum of Contemporary Art. So I took the train, the Orange line to the Red line. It was Tuesday night with a bitter chill that intimidates. But I was on a mission to see Circuit Des Yeux. I'm gonna remember the cold as part of the CDY experience, like icy breath. This is what sees me through the winter, if I can make the show. If I can make it up the stairs with fog in the glasses and a limp in my step in time to see something. I make it. Its now background not obstacle. I'm handed a flier with information about who is playing.  Oh, wow! This thing here says Haley moved to Chicago's south side. That's very rare and commendable. Usually when people move to Chicago its more likely north in the city, and without a glance south of Cermak.  The walls inside the MCA are white, brightly lit. The difference is very stark when you walk in, almost needing sunglasses.  Mine have fog, but I can't see through that. I didn't really look around much I just wanted to make it to this thing. Where she plays I believe is the cafeteria. Its just Haley Fohr and her acoustic guitar, only it .......isn't. Her voice is deep.  I fully intended to post this before the 19th December...that's not happening. But she leaves a heavy imprint live as well as in recording.  Over Due is what I bought from Ms Haley at MCA and it is absolutely crazy. I was still in the shock and awe phase when listening to My Name Is Rune, just to name one and then I walked into The Owl. Haley had a full band with drummer and keyboardist.   Verma played before and I am happy to say I was on time for that as well. So there is a post on them later.  Live performances are very singular moments. If you became familiar with the previous releases like CDY3 and Portrait you can still expect differences in the live performances. There were songs I immediately recognized.  Some I did not. With the drummer she sounded like early Dead Can Dance. That was not even in mind during the Empty Bottle gig. This time she reminded me like early DCD! Completely unexpected. I believe I was dancing to it even. I was right in front. This is not the kind of dark music that I expect to dance and yet the movements came. Perhaps in submerging myself in it I find the rhythm. That drummer was on fire and it was Haley that soaked him kerosene before lighting him up. When she says "I am a peach", (at least that is what it sounds like) she means the kind that bites you.

Her music is a barely veiled dark engine. I mean this is a fucking animal she casually takes out for a walk. This animal sometimes escapes its tense leash and runs. Most of this impression started out from seeing her and then from listening to the music later.....and then seeing her again at The Owl. 
  The engine that produced the musician that is CDY starts with components we share with her, when the wonder is gone. There is a lot that is resonant. I sense real frustration, anger, aggression...the lot of those feelings channeled in CDY,  and no wonder. When that feeling is done, everything around can look grey and used up. The soundscape is still dark but.....different. It requires a maturity to appreciate. All these feelings packaged as Haley does are not juvenile.   I can wildly fucking speculate even more from here. 
   Haley left for Chicago from Indiana. Specifically Lafayette and Bloomington. Its noteworthy for me because it is still the midwest and still a different world from Chicago.  The most I see of Indiana is E C or Munster, sometimes Whiting.  Haley brings to Chicago a cultural distinction. Chicago becomes the natural place to go to flourish but a lot of its culture has its origins far from the metropolis.  I read her interview for The Reader with Jessica Hopper. There is a lot of her story I found resonant.  Someone with otherworldly tremendous depth and old intelligence flexes and tenses with her guitar.....out of boredom.  Writing music and perhaps not knowing what will become of it is like trust-falling. You don't know who will catch this if it is to be caught at all.  And Haley runs off to move to Chicago's south-side, culturally different from the places she chooses to play.  It will be interesting what she creates from this point forward. I speculate about Bloomington and Lafayette, Indiana. I see them places as part of what originated her music. I think here about her interview with Jessica Hopper when she describes the music scene in Lafayette. You see the power in 20 intense fans. It makes you want to be in that 20. It gives the small town its Twin Peaks edge....street cred if you will......great now Haley rolled her eyes. I see in Haley an old sophisticated soul.  I don't think she's even 26 and her music sounds over 40. Its not a stretch to see why her music draws all the bearded weirdos from the woodwork.
Zig

Gel Set

This was completely unexpected. Bittersweet  at The Whistler was supposed to be the cool down after seeing I:Scintilla at Phyllis on Division earlier. I walked in to Philly Peroxide's night at Whistler on Milwaukee. If I see friends its great but I still wished I walked in with a copy of The Promise from Jose Rivera, short and sweet and packs a punch in its 90 or so pages. I didn't ponder on that long enough because friends of mine connected to The gone-too-soon Rosen Association invited me to go The Owl a short walk away.  Gel Set was about to go on at midnight. This is a thing to know about The Owl, their fucking late shows. Already having seen a concert, yeah lets do this. The euphoria of having seen  I:Scintilla has not even worn off yet. Gel Set (Laura Callier) I have seen before with Magic Key and I believe she has toured with Fielded. Her music is effortlessly dance-floor worthy, but its not as straight-forward or obvious as dance music can be.  There are weird shadows cast before your path. Its not as straight as it seems. You have the hmm..... cleanly landed beats that seem to pander but instead lead you further away from the familiar and into the otherworld. It resonates and then weird left. Before you know it. You're too scared to stop at a gas station to ask for directions. Perhaps its the music growing on me. I danced a lot to her set this time, more than the one gig at Empty Bottle.  Gel Set is at times trance inducing with her beats. This strikes me as someone that can write dance tracks in her day dreams. They are like snowflakes falling all around her subconscious mind it seems. These snowflakes don't fall in the expected landscapes in the expected seasons.  Dimly lit like a club with a disco lighting. There is something obviously dance-oriented to her chosen sounds. If you like music that easily induces you to move but you have a short attention span, some tracks will be for you and some won't. Ms Laura does enough left turns to throw off some but not all.  To those that have been thrown off. Give her a second look. GS will grow on you and your cardio will adjust to her.  It took me this second time to finally come around. There were perhaps two other shows I missed as I was coming around. I think she opened for Fielded once and I missed that set. I wish I was on time for it now.  Catching her set this time was an accident, the next gig I shall go deliberately.
Zig

I:Scintilla acoustic

 I:Scintilla did an acoustic set 12 Dec at Phylis on Division. I planned my night this way. Go see I:Scintilla and after, go to Whistler where my friend Philly Peroxide DJs. I shall dance instead of nursing this here sprained ankle! I did not count on being invited to go see Gel Set at The Owl at midnight. So this is the first of of an amazing night. To this first venue on Division I have never been to before. It feels like an eternity has grown between now and the last time I saw I:S.  Out of all the missed opportunities to see them sooner, the one that hurt is when they shared a stage with 8MM. For dragging my feet I missed the whole show, both bands. So catching  Ms Brittany do this acoustic set was a mission of sorts. So I make it. I catch something. Its not her first acoustic set of course. Its the first one I don't lean on YouTube to see. A lot of theater is stripped down when you go acoustic. There is a lot that you don't do acoustic and it was interesting and important for me to see this artist do this. All the dancing is out. The familiar movements that help you communicate are out. You sit down. Its just your voice and a guitar in a bar on a cold Thursday night. As cold nights go.......its  the kind that promotes laziness when you should be at the various stages of getting ready and fucking being there. Once you are out in it. You pretty much beat it.  I make it to a loose bar crowd that included faces that I have seen with I:S gigs before. But its been a while. When they were promoting their second album Dying And Falling that I have bought is when I started missing their shows. I'm far more familiar with the first album Optics and the all that relates. I got posters of seeing them as way back as 2007. You feel like the world has gone through countless cycles of hell and back and survived to see late 2013.  Its just Brit and a guitarist. Her voice is obliged to hover delicate like a humming bird where it once galloped and without the usual instruments. If not for captured YouTube videos this was my first time seeing this...acoustic from I:S. And it worked. She sounds wonderful. I wanted to see this, I wanted to support, and this Thursday was not cold enough to make me miss shit.  I think Brittany sang some covers. It matters different when its a few people at a bar....hmm more that that but less than a regular concert crowd. I wanted to be in the bar to hear the rare acoustic set. When they tour nationally its going to be different. This is what you can catch locally from them. I was real thankful this was no cover at the door. I was so broke. As research for this post I saw some live acoustic I:S videos on YouTube. And then say I square that with the latest gig. You want to reinforce the memory. Then it was done, and off I went for Bittersweet, Philly Peroxide's DJ night at The Whistler to kind of bask in the glow. Two separate events that relate and so complement each other, enhancing a night. And Philly's Bittersweet event was more a link in a greater chain still because of who I met there. It was not over after I:Scintilla. It was a great start, and

still something to stand on its own.
Zig

The Bellwether Syndicate

I caught part of their set, a small but significant part. The last few songs, a good view of what the greater whole is. So as late as I arrived I still caught something......a greater whole, which the performance is part of it. Bellwether Syndicate have played for their local Chicago audience before but Empty Bottle is different from Nocturna. Its different from Whitby. Presumably the Empty Bottle audience is less aware of William's Faith And The Muse past and how influential he is to a whole subculture. There are nights and venues where you fully expect or desire your black clad people. Those of us that aged with the Bauhaus/Siouxsie  shirts, and added to that collection, stayed actively identified to the culture. There is something old about this new band, and that is part of why I went. For starters if its something suggested by Scary Lady Sarah, I usually like it, and she's playing guitar (under the name Sarah Rose). And now there's William Faith, and where do I start? I got the shirts. I got a collection of CDs I can trace to him. When he decided to call Chicago home, I was happy. And I would see him regularly at Nocturna and at shoegaze or death-rock/goth themed nights.  Many fond memories of seeing other bands are extra special because he was in the audience. This was my first time seeing William Faith in his new band. They were playing from the EP The Night Watch. All the times I could have seen them....hmmm, this was it for me. This makes it for me. This was at Empty Bottle, and half the audience was non-goth. Some were people from other local bands with apparently little awareness of the subculture that shared the Bottle with them. These are people I have no expectation of seeing at Nocturna or anything remotely close to goth.  They were a perfect uninfluenced crowd. Then there was us loyal Nocturna goths, many that I've known over the years. Lots of things raced through the mind as William played that one last Faith And The Muse track.  A good five or so danced. I would have been among them had it not been for this sprained ankle. A lot of us goths really do see outside our permeable borders. We actively listen to and seek out and support a wide variety of music. Its from this subculture that I learned to support artists/musicians early. In that room I saw some of those musicians from the bands that I found out from those that dress in black....specifically the one playing guitar . From this community I learned a great many things, indeed. BellWether Syndicate is William Faith's new band with Sarah Rose (Scary Lady if you will) and Philly Peroxide. As I said before, I caught a small part of their show, and so the rest of the imprint is from listening to the EP. I must say it was a very empowering drive to hear All Fire on the way home. It cascades from there. And Sarah sings! I mean. Its her and wow!  You Can See Through Me right off starts on a casual but quick pace, but not something Sarah has to run down. All five tracks actually feel hmm, well paced....Hmmm when you've written music for a subculture that has dancing woven into its fibers, what you write will spark, direct and maintain attention.  For me the listener, vaguely I feel these are gears that somehow I have handled before and are happy to hold again. The long-term relationship I have felt at least since the FTM days flexes on the strength of Bellwether Syndicate. Did that sound right? In one performance I see a greater continuum. You see a longevity that you want to translate into one's one life.  Alright. I just need to post this. Its been a long time.
Zig

Lightfoils

I was in the middle of I-55 when it hit me this Lightfoils show was at Empty Bottle and not Subt's. That made the trip shorter and for relatively easy parking. I park right next to the church. My slow healing sprained ankle allows me this Walking Dead limp that I think creeps people out. I make it in time to see Highest Order. It has to be noted here to go see them again. Since 2010 Lightfoils is active in maintaining their place in the Chicago Dream pop/Shoegaze pantheon, and within that Cory plays bass for them....Lightfoils and Panda Riot.  Its actually amazing how so few people are spread about so many bands. One person can count as two bands. I briefly paused to see the Lightfoils shirt by the merch table, dark grey....a welcome and doable change from the usual black. Not quite a stretch for me I know. The band was kind enough to just give me the shirt. I am humbled and eternally grateful. That was after the show. This was my first time seeing the new voice of Jane Zabeth.
  
  Its great to see the band continue. I get my stamp and ask if they started and they were next. Awesome! Its noteworthy to see Cory's Panda Riot bandmates on my way to see who it was that I can hear on the way in, Highest Order. Oh and Corey the drummer from Moritat. He has another project coming as well.
  Suddenly there was this pocket of time that allowed me these unexpected impressions and a cool chat with Cory's girlfriend outside for a cigarette smoke. We went on about e-cigarettes and how totally inadequate they are, diet fucking dog shit.  As we talked a  girl fresh out of her taxi was about ready to hand her money to us to let her in the wrong door. Clearly it was her first time there, but good for her because she still made it on time. So we go inside. Cory as always is so cool with me and I feel at ease among his Lightfoils bandmates as a result. As a pre-sold believer I am not short on reasons to like this band. Perhaps I should go on with it from here since up to this point it was about how I got here and not the bloody music.
  Hearing Jane made a fan out of me all over again. Breezy, fast-playing and still casual as a stroll on a beach. Obviously sweet but with muscle-car balls like in The Italian Job. There is just enough turbulence and strength for Jane to sound right and to make people move. If people are moving its because they are listening, as indeed occurred that Thursday night at Empty Bottle. I noticed about 5 or so. I would have been among them if not for this bloody sprained ankle. For their set I noticed a good concentration of medium-light audience in the front. Urgent /turbulent music over calm-soothing-angelic female voice sound uncommon again.   Notice the bass on Into Deep Sea, for me its the beginning of what makes this song so dance worthy for Sarah and Philly's shoegaze night, or Late Bar. Indeed this trait easily spans all songs on the self-titled EP released on Saint Marie records.They did play a new song that is leaning more aggressive.  However you are hooked, there is more to enjoy from there.  I'm on Facebook and I notice the posts of performers I'm fortunate enough to be friends with. Many live too far away for me to see their gigs. I'm glad to see them active in keeping their music alive. I still feel the sting of not seeing them play. So what I catch feels like something I almost missed, and ever more happy I am for catching it.
Zig

Distant Cities

Here's another post that I started long ago and far away and never finished. Hell I barely actually started. Its about when I saw Distant Cities at a Free Monday at Empty Bottle. I never stopped thinking about them since seeing them. They are playing again Monday 11 November at Whistler. And so my post on seeing them are well past due. I was hooked ever since Look Away, the first track of Walk Away. I will soon take a closer listen to the lyrics because they sound so stark in contrast to dance-worthy sweetness. Words like "homicidal feelings" really stick out like that one song from Goodfellas. Olivia is going on while Tommy snaps and takes out a made guy. So lets see what do we recall. Olivia's voice was nice and clear, fine almost operatic. Their sound seems minimally produced, basic, 80's nostalgic. Sounding like how we want to remember things while also sounding new and not retreaded or formulaic. There are so many individual things that will be memorable the first time, from how they sounded to Olivia's glasses. Its not a stretch to say that I take you to see them the first time you will go see them on your own the second, if you live around Chicago. I marvel and cheer on the greatness of acts when they perform in tiny places like Whistler. I could not believe my good fortune for seeing their entire set. I've missed others since and I feel the sting of it and so I write this to remind myself not to miss them again. I'll have far more to articulate when I see them this time. I need a refresh of the source material.
Zig

Walking Bicycles at Hideout

Walking Bicycles I see after missing some significant shows. So this one was a fucking mission. .....and I made it to at least half their set at Hideout. Unfortunately I missed completely the previous Unicycle Loves You set but so goes this rough first world existence. Cory missed the whole thing but at least he got to hang out with them after wards, my distracted wanderings lead me away and then I missed them......Yeah, that Cory.
  It was brief, but hell that was my fault.   These few performances I see in a larger context. I go to refresh the picture. I go see them.......for the same as with Laura Meyer and well, everyone. The picture moves but something you find there identifies with you. Its nice to see them somewhere else besides Empty Bottle. It feels like another place is nurturing a spark that to me is already raging flames. So what was the crowd like? I got to the front easily enough. It was a porous yet not a light crowd, a good weave-around. I parked...far and as I got closer to Hideout I could hear the band playing already and it was like feeling the sand of the hourglass through your fingers. I hauled ass. Here's my ID, let me in. What they perform live and shall record is a departure from roads paved but not taken. They are in the darker end of the continuum. Its no bullshit how they got there. Julius went to prison. In my mind thats in the landscape of the world contained in their music. When I say "urban, decay, dark, I include a prison town. I don't do so for frivolous entertainment. Its to recognize a significance in the narrative. Its not of course the sole influence, this is me acknowledging it in their narrative as something they have successfully survived and is behind them.  So I find that inspiring. Oh and on top of that I like the music too..... I almost forgot. Oh and it gets a little better....they are friends. So forgive the fucking bias, and where the fuck was I?...... Now they are wiser as well as hardened. Got that.....Oh, that's right back to the music.......It seems that every instrument gets that space to separately shape the sound. Walking Bicycles are ensemble players writing your urban decay Glengarry Glen Ross soundtrack. Yes I did read the play. How much Mamet have you read, eh? Fucking hell where was I......The bass is aggressive like Alec Baldwin telling it to you and I like how the lead guitar seems to answer this back with this finesse. So no one instrument dominates, they all sound that way. Don't make me stretch this references further.What I mean with urban decay is not just the superficial outer coat of grayness. Their specific familiarity is deeper, into the monstrous, but I think I covered that in a previous paragraph.  Between the two guitars having it out to a frenzied beat from Deric the drummer....(yes that Drummer) form patterns that capture attention for Jocelyn to take over in just the right time. You get all these separate layers of sound, bouncy and rough in that way you would want post-punk to be.  Its not clean, sleek. Its messy in acknowledging the shadows. You are going to drive through more pot holes and step into more pools of shallow water. Its about what you do after wards, the now-what after the peak starting from the bottom of where you fell. This is all fucking subjective of course, me going on about the band trying to impose a meaning to the music. Its all in trying to get people to listen to it, may I assure.  I thought it would be an easy sell to one with a PJ Harvey shirt in the closet. Jocelyn's slight husk to her voice gives her a kind of authority. This near-future post-recession, urban-decay, post-Siouxsie, post-punk image is something I saw in them since forever. Its been there since 2004 and I was made aware of it in mid 2007. All you other posts need to form a line and take a number. Wait until you are called. The picture moves and it evolves and will do so further since I'm going on about this without reading lyrics to all their new stuff. Before understanding words, the sound instinctively resonates from a darker.....wiser place. Fucking hell, I think I covered that too...multiple times.
Zig.