The premiere of “The BQE” at BAM’s gorgeous Howard Gilman Opera House was unlike any other Sufjan show. The audience may have offered as many heads with gray hair as those with elaborate hairdos. Before starting the last number in the “Sufjan Stevens Plays the Hits” part of the program, the singer said they’d been treated like royals during the making of “The BQE”, and hoped we’d had our money’s worth. By then I had decided that at times, performance and music can be two different things, and though I could already barely remember the particulars of “The BQE”, it had delivered the warm and fuzzy feeling with which I had hoped to renew my concert-going habit.
The lounge area that is now part of Soundfix Records sits cozily past its music collection, and is a venue you want to take advantage of. The intimacy it provides is unlike any other record store’s, since there are tables over which specialty drinks can be had in a laid back atmosphere, away from all the records under bright lights of commerce; and the size of the room itself is just right. Bowerbirds took no more than 15 minutes to set up. After the most basic of sound checks, the acoustics proved its worth as well. Other events may prove otherwise, but the venue was a superb fit for this particular band (while handling my t-shirt purchase, singer Phil Moore said that he had previously been unaware of the store’s existence, but was glad to have discovered it through playing it; on stage he mentioned how good it felt to play a small venue after touring with the Mountain Goats for the past few weeks).
At least as far as performances go, there seems to be a difference of principle between classical and popular music. While in classical tradition the works are subjects of scholarly devotion, precision and admiration, popular music thrives in creating an atmosphere where its audience can participate in celebration and festivity, or even grief and loss. Often, the intention of popular music and its understanding of the human spirit supersedes its genius, whereas the music in classical tradition is so sacred that it feels like the people who listen to it are secondary to it by far. We can be reminded, of course, that there are several bands today that blur the difference of traditions, which makes the concept of Wordless Music Series appropriate (and sure, Sufjan’s mini-orchestra flies in a Town Hall setting).
Studio recordings of Bill Callahan, including those released under the alias Smog, make it clear that the main offering here is a memorable voice that promises to tell a story. His belongs to that family of voices which has a confident air of the old without actually having encountered it in the past long before it or in the aging that awaits in the future. So this much was to be expected from the show at Southpaw, and this much was held mostly true. There was a part of the audience that had understood this and come there expecting to be mesmerized, but there was the rest given to chattering. Consequently, from what I could tell, out of the voices of two girls talking loudly during a song came a series of “shut up” and “shhh”, and the next thing you know, someone had inevitably been punched by someone else. The band did not stop, but later Bill walked to the front of the stage to ask vaguely, but privately, if people were okay.
The last of the free summer shows at South Street Seaport was a celebration with an eager mass of Battles and Deerhunter fans. Though I missed much of the latter, who opened, much love was shown towards both bands, with traversing through the crowd a task as daunting as it had been when Animal Collective played the first of these shows. Battles, with their drummer up front (and why not, he was their gem), performed much like architects. This impression may have been influenced by their clean-cut appearances (not too mention all the colors – yellow drum set, pink and green shirts, a red-bodied keyboard – and the unusual layout on the stage itself). The performance itself seemed equally clean-cut, though the structurally sound foundations were padded by a feeling of loose explorations.
hooves on the turf is a mostly-music blog based out of brooklyn. i can be reached at hoovesontheturf [at] gmail [dot] com - please send me your lovely music as an attached mp3 or an mp3 link. if i like what you send, i'll be sure to ask for more.
ECGroom in Charlotte Gainsbourg at Bell House, Jan 19. Photos.: “Nice photos. I was there on the 20th (my short post: http://ecgroom.tumblr.com/post /345476631/charlotte-gainsbour g-at-bellhouseny-she-was ). I think you’ve got that right...”
