In 2008 I couldn't attend No Age's gig at the same place, Galeria Zé dos Bois. This time I proudly bought a ticket to this band's show. I can assure you they're really good live. The setlist was cool, ranging from tunes of Weirdo Rippers, Nouns and their most recent EP. I even got the chance to crowdsurf! Also, Randy gave to me and to my friends his guitar and we started playing it like crazy, while he was jamming with the pedals simultaneously: awesome. Here are some videos so that you can see how good it was:
Eraser, live
Me and my friends playing with Randal's guitar, live
Zeni Geva played on 3rd May of 2010 at Galeria Zé dos Bois, in Lisbon, Portugal. It sure was a fine gig. KK Null talked japanese sometimes and kind of entertained the crowd. Tabata even jumped and played guitar in his own peculiar way. Yoshida was always well, he never failed, his drum skills are precise and stealthy. The setlist was awesome; they played mostly songs from their most recent album. "Implosion" was a highlight. There was also some jamming along the songs, I believe; and it was always captivating. Here are some videos of the gig:
Teengirl Fantasy's show was quite calm, proper to their music. Chilling, listening to their beats, while they were having fun creating melodies out of awkward loops, many people got along with it... Some just wanted Wavves to pop up on the stage and start playing though. But I liked it, I thought they were good and promising too. Below is a video of Teengirl Fantasy performing (recorded by João Almeida with my camera):
Wavves final gig of their european tour... how can I describe it? Marvelous, paradoxal, genius. Some hated the show, some loved it. I'm by the side of the ones who fell in love with that decaying spirit. Nathan yelled "boo" and then shouted with the whole crowd "satan! satan! satan!". Pure genius. Download this recording to see for yourself. I couldn't film this show, but a friend of mine used the my camara and recorded almost the whole thing. However, he didn't film many crowdsurfs (don't ask me why...), including when I crowdsurfed twice. There were people outside Galeria Zé dos Bois astonished with the show, some of them even stanted there for like half an hour straight, seeing us all have fun. The setlist wasn't bad... They didn't play "No hope kids"- many people wanted this one to be sang. "To the dregs" was featured, "Wavves" too, in which Nathan crowdsurfed while playing his guitar at the same time!!!... "So Bored" was the last song: at the end there was a stage invasion. This is all recorded by João Almeida with my camera. You can see this below:
Ok, last sunday, by a pre-dusk part of the day, I filmed Soft Circle (Hisham Bharoocha's project, since he departed from Black Dice). It was a cool gig, that started more or less by 17h:45min. Hisham uses loops with modern music technology, then looping again with his guitar's help and some pedals and finally, he sings and plays drums, while these loops set a dazzling beat, with rhythmic cycles that hypnotize the viewer. Hisham, himself, seems like a spiritual person. A great musician, that excells in good timing while playing his drums, this project that started around 2007 seems to promise us a lot of good music. Soft Circle's second album, with Ben Vida, is scheduled to be released by Spring of 2010. For more info on Soft Circle, click here.
I'll upload the entire gig, if I can spare some more time... By now, I uploaded this short one:
John Maus started playing keyboards along with Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti. However, he later decided to begin a solo career. He showed to Panda Bear [Noah Lennox, who's also in Animal Collective) his music and he enjoyed it. Later, Maus started producing albums and his label is currently Upset the Rhythm (mostly psychedelic pop music, I'd say). He also works at the University of Hawai at Manoa as a political philosophy and theory instructor. You can say his music is experimental or some sort of psychedelic pop, with influences from DIY techniques. He has released countless underground cd's (I have a CD-R he released when he went to play here at Galeria Zé dos Bois, in Lisbon). This album entitled "Love is Real" was released in 2007 and is his second album. I love its overall mood and how John's deep voice fits along with his synths and other digital touches. He knows hot to give his music purity and wisdom: his lyrics show us a melancholic side that simultaneously describes a serious caring and love for other persons. It is as John Maus brings us a nostalgic 80s music, with reverb and echoing sounds, that can be compared in some ways to Joy Division's ethereal "Closer". Pitchfork only gave this album 6.4 out of 10.0. Rate your music gave it 3.68 out of 5.00, I think (112 reviews were made to obtain this single result). Drowned in sound has also given them a good review (I think they don't have numerical reviews). So, if you want to hear this philosopher's music simply click right here. Hope you like it.
I'll leave here a video of "Tenebrae" a soft mellow song from this album:
And I'll also deposit a short lousy video of him playing in Z.D.B. (Galeria Zé dos Bois, in Lisbon):
This debut album was released this year and they're making efforts to make their second synth/avant-pop/indie/club/ soft electro masterpiece arrive on stores by the end of this year, I believe (or at least, as Busy Gangnes told me, they're working on their album this Fall). Pitchfork only gave them 6.7 out of 10.0... I think it's because, as Melissa Livaudais said in an interview, when she was working as a waitress at a bar, the guy who reviewed their album, was unsatisfied with Melissa, who (as she said) was in a bad mood and didn't answer him that well. I think it's a bit childish to review an album because of this happening, but the world is full of people who suffer from Peter Pan's syndrome. Other reviews: Uncut gave them 70 out of 100; Slant Magazine gave them 4 stars out of 5 stars; Drowned in Sound says that this is one of the year's best albums, along with Animal Collective's "Merryweather Post Pavillion"; BBC said they have potential but must make more efforts; etc. They hail from the hipster epicentre - you guessed it - Brooklyn, NY. With fellows like MGMT, High Places, LEIF, Das Racist and many other artists rising from this nest of music, Telepathe managed to get out of there (they criticised the too much "experimental spirit" in Brooklyn and admitted they didn't know that much of what was/is going on there). They come more specifically from Williamsburg, yeah, the artsy part of Brooklyn, also home of some considerable number of fellow jews. Chrome's on it had been previously released on a EP, I think, which consisted of around 7 remixes of the song, from various cool bands. So Fine is their mind-lifting single- I love it. Trilogy is their biggest song, which is touching and with somewhat subjective lyrics. I can't stand it is also a great song, that has an awesome start, with synths and then Busy and Melissas' voices crashing together, in a way they become one single compact and angelical voice. The album has around 45 minutes of nice, ear-softening music and sounds, that delight me. You can try it out here, it's really worth it (I've done a review previously, but someone erased it... at least they could've told the blog owners).
Their awesome "So fine" hit can be heard below and features as bonus the official videoclip:
Telepathe visited Portugal some days ago: they arrived here on 18th and went to Milan 21th July (at least I think so). I got to see two shows out of three shows they gave here. The first one I saw was in Lisbon (18th July) and the other one was in Coimbra (20th July). I'm editing some video series of these shows. Currently, there's only on youtube the gig they gave in Lisbon, at GaleriaZDB. You can watch pt1, pt2, pt3 and pt4. I'll try to edit the Coimbra series of videos as soon as I can though.
I got the opportunity to take a picture with them. They're seriously (and probably) the nicest people I've met in a band.
This is the finest sonar paintingthat's currently living in the Blogosphere: this artifact is so sophisticated that it wraps you inthe most awkward conversationsdealing with music. However, besmart enough not to get too muchmelomaniac... or else, you'll be caught by this sonar painting called "Serotonin Sounds".
You can contact us... Just send an e-mail to the following address: serotoninsounds@gmail.com
In 2008 I couldn't attend No Age's gig at the same place, Galeria Zé dos Bois. This time I proudly bought a ticket to this band's show. I can assure you they're really good live.
