Saturday, January 24, 2009

Matt & Kim (my new best friends) at The Grog Shop

A friend of mine asked me what a “grog” was last time I was at the Grog Shop to see Soft Circle, Best Fwends, Matt and Kim, and No Age play. I thought about it for a while, didn’t know the answer, and thought to myself that if “grog” meant something exciting or clever, I could use it as a funny intro for this article. But it actually means “rum cut with water,” which has nothing to do with this show. So, for the purposes of this concert review, “Grog: n. A place a lot like a bigger, more intense, and sometimes more entertaining version of the ‘Sco.”

Soft Circle (AKA Hisham Akira Bharoocha) opened the show with a bang, literally, showering us all with sampled beeps, bloops, swishes, and varying drum distortions, while he complimented it all with live drumming. On his Myspace, he describes his music as “Morphing and melting memories shaped into blissful lightscapes of the past and present.” The music was danceable, technically interesting, and masterfully formulated, with a definite focus on rhythmic progression. As a former member of both Black Dice (up until Creature Comforts) and of Lightning Bolt, Soft Circle is the Brooklyn music scene incarnate. Focused on noise as performance art, Hisham captivated those early enough to enjoy the first opener.
Best Fwends, perhaps the polar opposite of Soft Circle, stormed the stage next, bringing with them some huge, floppy grey things, a park bench, and a backdrop littered with what can only be described as ugly faces (and one cat face). Where Soft Circle was focused on craft and on musical integrity, Best Fwends existed to entertain. I had been previously familiar with their remixes, but never with their original music, which turned out to be a brilliant spoof on hardxcore culture, as I was infinitely reminded of metalcore shows I went to in high school. The gimmick of the two guys being best friends actually worked, as they gave each other sporadic high fives and shared loving banter in between screamy, electronically distorted songs. The grey, lumpy objects on the ground soon revealed themselves to be blow-up gargoyles – huge ones that eventually ended up crowd surfing and consequentially being squished and punctured by enthusiastic fans. My friend who works at Goodwill in Cleveland lamented the fact that he’d probably be given these props the next day at work. The highlight of Best Fwend’s performance was the musical and spiritual culmination entitled “Hail,” which is all about worshiping Satan. Both of the present band members marched ceremoniously into the audience, hands poised in prayer position, looking profoundly convinced of Satan’s grandeur.

After setting up a projection of Zoolander onto the wall of the Grog Shop, Matt and Kim, the most joyous band alive, made our ears twinkle and our toes tap uncontrollably with their Brooklyn indie pop gems. Both humble and insanely smiley, seeing Matt and Kim live was an overwhelmingly happy experience. Songs like “Yea Yeah” (which has the most stereotypically “indie” music video ever) and “Lightspeed” (which is about a super cute game of baseball) rendered amazing crowd responses, crescendoing into Matt’s positively adorable attempts to hang on the ceiling. Having Zoolander playing in the background actually added some interesting light effects to the show, as every once in a while, Kim’s drumsticks would leave light tracers in which you could potentially see Ben Stiller or Will Ferrell’s face. I swear, Kim never stopped smiling, and Matt never stopped enjoying the cool effects he had on his new keyboard. If there ever was a band I would love to be best friends with, it’s Matt and Kim.

Did you see No Age last year at the ‘Sco when they opened for Liars? Oh, you did? Well, this performance was exactly the same. I enjoy listening to Weirdo Rippers and Nouns every once in awhile, but I must admit that most of their songs lack originality within the context of their full body of work. The result is that their live show lacks excitement. Ok, so it was really boring. The most effort they put into connecting with the audience was walking out a few feet, surrounding themselves with people for a couple minutes, then returning to the stage for more guitarcentric, underproduced rock music with indecipherable lyrics and little, if any, musical aptitude. The drums sounded messy, the guitar was overbearing, and the interesting textures present on their recorded material got washed over by the amount of flair they were trying, and failing to have.

A trip to the Grog Shop is sometimes the best thing you can do for yourself. Think about it: four decent bands in quick succession, an escape from the Oberlin bubble, the presence new faces you don’t recognize awkwardly from class or “that one party,” and a noticeable absence of ‘Sco smells… Also, if you’re 21, they do serve grog.

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