Photos by Nick Pereslugoff

Studio efforts can often belie a band’s strengths. It’s not too surprising that you’ll often find a band that shines just a bit more in a live context, but it’s the pure musical talent that often seems a constant between concerts and studio recordings. On Thursday night, however, as Here We Go Magic celebrated the release of their latest album, A Different Ship, it wasn’t any sort of energy or intangibles that made their set so entertaining. No, Here We Go Magic maintained a similar laid back ethos to their studio recordings. It was their spectacular musicianship that was on display. Though present in their studio work, obviously, seeing the precision with which each member of the band attacked their respective instruments in person made their talent even more apparent.
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While Friday night’s sound system may have added an extra oomph to the show, it was the location of Saturday’s show that provided it unexpected transcendence. Even the idea of seeing several ambient artists in the sanctuary of a church had my curiosity piqued, but that piqued curiosity didn’t have me prepared for what was coming Saturday night.

Upon my arrival at West Park Presbyterian Church, any skepticism in my mind around the whole idea was quelled. No, we weren’t about to watch some dudes sit around on laptops in the basement of a run down church. The laptops were instead set up on the altars and an exceedingly large screen loomed behind it all. As Poland’s Jacaszek took to the stage to perform a trio off of 2011’s Glimmer, it was clear that this was a spectacle to behold. Though Jacaszek’s music crawls at a snails pace, building to crescendo in the most laborious way possible, it felt exceedingly appropriate for the setting. Sitting in the pews and simply absorbing the sounds presented before me would’ve been enough to make for an interesting performance, but with the psychedelic visuals that backed them the set became something entirely moving and transfixing. It was peaceful, welcoming and utterly uplifting, and certainly nothing to anticipate the set forthcoming from Biosphere and Lustmord.

Though the next set was similar in mechanics, featuring two men seated at their laptops for about an hour, there was something so deeply unsettling about the whole atmosphere that it became something really special. Perhaps it was the location, I mean it isn’t everyday you get to see a show where the performers are seated at an altar, but it seems more likely to me a testament to the audio/visual experience presented to us. Biosphere and Lustmord’s piece was equal parts beautiful and disconcerting. The dark ambient legends created waves of noise, strings, and more noise (seriously, the photographer in front of me had his fingers in his ears at any moment he wasn’t taking a picture) which paired with post-apocalyptic footage on the large screen behind them functioned to mildly disturb everyone in the room. Where Jacaszek was floaty and peaceful, the piece constructed by Biosphere and Lustmord was dark and brooding. Ambient music often functions to fill a space, to create a peaceful environment for all the listeners around, and while Biosphere and Lustmord certainly fulfilled the first function, the second seems far from their m.o. Both visually and of course aurally, the piece was unlike most things I’d ever seen. It was unsettling without feeling like horror movie music, without resorting to cheap shock tactics of ear-curdling screams. This was truly dark music and provided another interesting turn of Unsound Festival.

Though I wasn’t really intending this to be the last night of Unsound that I covered, it turned out that way after age restrictions prevented my admittance to Sunday’s show. That aside, it might be a more fitting ending. Unsound brought together an incredibly diverse lineup from across the world and slammed the acts together in billings across New York City, so seeing two ambient legends duke it out on stage at a church really feels like the only way such an event could end. It was yet another special night, and perhaps the most emotionally moving of the bunch, a true testament to the outstanding lineup that Unsound put together. Here’s to hoping they get together something just as great next year.

Electronic music, and particularly bass music, is one of the more fickle beasts of the music community. In the right circumstance, with the right sound equipment, it can sound and feel like the best thing you’ve ever heard, but inferior technology can leave something wanting. Fortunately Friday night’s show at the Warsaw was firmly in the former camp rather than the latter.

As doors opened Brooklyn’s (and yes all the acts I caught at this show were from Brooklyn) Zemi17 had already taken the stage. Though there wasn’t much to look at aside from the projections, the visceral experience was what made this set interesting. Due to the speakers that surrounded the listening space (I would say dancefloor, but not too much dancing was happening at least at this point) the whole floor was shaking. This is the ideal environment for hearing electronic music, each hit of Zemi17’s four on the floor concoctions was felt, both literally and metaphorically. Bass rumbles made their presence known in the hearts, minds, and faces of attendees. Though his set didn’t resemble brostep in the slightest, the appeal of such a concert becomes clear when you’re provided with a sound system such as this. When you can physically feel each note, in addition to hearing it, you become so much more involved in the experience. His set was full of insistent beats surrounded by spacey instrumentals and it made for a perfect start to the night in a mostly empty room.

Laurel Halo’s set, though no less affecting, certainly was lighter on the rumbles. Instead we were treated to her angelic vocals typical of her early EPs. Though the set was mostly entertaining, the instrumental numbers tended to drag a bit due to their lack of physical presence. They were still interesting to listen to, but they lacked the punch of the set that Zemi17 had delivered shortly before. Fortunately this was made up for by the abundance of vocal tracks that she dropped. Though she wasn’t really putting on much of a show aside from the headbobbing that accompanied each track, it was still a pleasant listen and one that certainly surpasses the shows that many laptop musicians put on night after night.

The last act that I caught, due to the increasingly late hour of the night, was Brooklyn scenester Daniel Martin-McCormick, performing that night under his Ital moniker. I’ll admit a bit of bias, the album he released earlier this year, Hive Mind, is probably my favorite electronic release of the year so far, so it was going to be a pleasing set regardless of what sort of performance Martin-McCormick put together. Even Hive Mind couldn’t prepare me for how immense this live set was. Though Martin-McCormick certainly benefitted from the punch of the aforementioned sound system, tracks like album opener (and set closer) “Doesn’t Matter If You Love Him” took on an amazingly vibrant live presence. On record, many of these tracks, though structured in a fashion familiar to fans of House music, take on a much more insular bent. In their studio incarnations, these are tracks that while reliant on insistent beats maintain some sort of bedroom characteristic. They feel like tracks that you should be listening to on headphones rather than in a club, but finally hearing them in a club changed all that. Maybe it was Martin-McCormick’s enthusiastic dance moves that accompanied every button press on his midi controller, but these tracks seemed like absolute bangers live, and they never really struck me that way on record. Through clattering drums, overemphasized bass and the ever present vocal samples, Ital constructed a live set unmatched by many electronic producers much more popular than he was.

Though I was unable to stick around to catch sets by Hieroglyphic Being, Demdike Stare, and Monolake, the set at the Warsaw certainly represented another interesting dynamic of Unsound Festival. Friday night’s lineup was firmly dancefloor minded and was all the better for it.

If my experience of the first night of Unsound Festival was defined mostly by sparseness — by mostly subdued takes on intensely emotional sounds, then my second night was the exact opposite. Though I missed out on Actress and Hype Williams at Le Poisson Rouge, the sets that I did take in at Lincoln Center were special enough in their own regard, and entirely different to the sets that I caught the night before.
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All Photos by Philip Cosores

Metronomy

In the five years since I first saw Metronomy so much has changed about the band that it’s hard to believe that they’re the same entity at all. Today’s Metronomy is much more confident and polished, and this work has obviously paid off as they managed to draw a decent sized crowd to the outdoor stage in the scorching early afternoon. In the heat their more breezy, yacht rock-like tracks drifted nicely on the breeze and seemed to have a cooling effect. Their dancier numbers such as “The Bay” and “Heartbreaker” were too infectious not to move around to, even if it meant more sweat. The closing “Radio Ladio” was a full-on party and sing along in one, with everyone down the front getting totally involved in making it a send-off to remember for the Brits.

Le Butcherettes

First Aid Kit

Santigold

Santigold’s alt pop seems fresh because it’s so perfectly executed yet it still seems spontaneous. This is true of her live show, which incorporates a tight band, all dressed the same way, and a pair of energetic and entertaining back up dancers with choreographed moves, which makes the show seem polished, but then she’ll do something like invite a bunch of the audience on stage to dance around and things feel like barely-controlled madness. Santigold played all the favourites from her debut album of a few years past, as well as introduced the audience to a host of new numbers that were all very well received. Like Metronomy she managed to keep the audience dancing throughout, whether it was to something they knew like “Creator,” or an instantly punchy new track like “Freak Like Me.” She saved the biggest dance number of all for the end with “Big Mouth” and had many parts of the audience bouncing around to the rave-style number; a memorable way to end her set.

Real Estate

The Growlers

Fitz And The Tantrums

Wild Flag

Having already seen Wild Flag tear apart the intimate Troubadour last year, it was interesting to see how they transferred their sound to a much bigger arena which came in the form of the outdoor stage. Basically, they just made everything bigger to match; the riffs were more monstrous, Carrie Brownstein’s growls and wails more fearsome, and everyone’s rock star moves seemed more extroverted. The four women sounded as tight as ever rushing through jams like “Boom” and “Romance,” but were happy to tease out longer jams like “Glass Tambourine” and “Race Horse”; effortlessly dragging the audience through the loops with them. The band wrapped up with a cover of The Distillers’ “Ask The Angels” which saw Brownstein and co at their punchiest and most fun all afternoon, it was almost as if they were just having fun jamming out an old favourite, and we were fortunate enough to get to watch them doing it.

AraabMUZIK

The Hives

It seems like such a long time since The Hives were last around that it was kind of surprising that they still held down a prime spot in the early evening on the main stage, but as soon as they arrived in front of the audience we were all reminded why. The band is led by one of the most charismatic front men in the business in the form of Howlin’ Pelle Almqvist, who had the audience eating out of his hand to the point where he got them to cheer his drinking some water. The band sounded as tight and loud as ever, and songs such as “Main Offender,” “Walk Idiot Walk” and “Hate To Say I Told You So” sounded as brilliant as ever, reminding us why they came to be such a popular band in the first place. By the final track, “Tick Tick Boom,” Almqvist felt confident enough to get the whole audience to sit down and lay back, which they just about managed in the small space, and then everyone jumped up in unison, creating the perfect explosion for the final chorus. It’s good to have The Hives back.

The Weeknd

The Weeknd’s performance on Sunday night was certainly one of the most anticipated of the festival, so it was a shame that the sound levels did not quite match up to what we’d expect. Nevertheless the sexy bass kept things pumping, and Tesfaye and his recently-put-together band seemed like they had been playing together for years. They were confident enough to tease “Dirty Diana” before seguing straight into “The Birds Part 1,” and by the end when they brought out the true favourites from House of Balloons they had the audience rapt attention as they sung along.

Justice

Girl Talk

Beirut

At The Drive-In

Florence + The Machine

Dr. Dre & Snoop Dogg

The start of Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg’s set was tailored to show how legendary the duo are, from the golden images of themselves that appeared on the screen, to the early playing of old classics like “The Next Episode,” “Gin N Juice” and “Ain’t Nothin’ But A G Thang,” to which they had every word screamed right back at them by thousands of people. The Nate Dogg tribute “Ain’t No Fun” was a nice touch, but things started to get pretty weird around the time they covered House of Pain’s “Jump Around.” Not that their performance was bad at all, and it had the desired effect of getting people moving, but it still seemed like an odd choice considering all the hits these two heavyweights have that they didn’t play.

Things started getting crazy when the guests started appearing; Wiz Khalifa ambled on to play his weed anthem “Young, Wild and Free,” Kendrick Lamar got a nice introduction before playing “The Recipe” with Dr. Dre, 50 Cent appeared out of nowhere for some of his hits, and then Eminem came up out of the floor for a couple of newer songs, but most notably “Forgot About Dre,” which might go down as the best song of the night, thanks in no small part to Em’s charisma. Oh yeah, and let’s not forget about the Tupac hologram, which did exactly the same dance moves as last week (as expected) and was caught on thousands and thousands of cameras by the expecting audience.

The performance was capped off with a brutal fierce delivery of “Still D.R.E.”; the two veterans showing that even at the end of a long set, twenty plus years into their career, they still spit as calmly and precisely as ever. Their whole set basically seemed like one final big blow out party – what better way to end the weekend?

All Photos by Philip Cosores

Black Lips

Inarguably, from this writer’s point of view, Saturday is the most stacked day of Coachella this year, in terms of lineup, and this started early with Black Lips taking to the Mojave stage just after 2pm. Those who had made it down early enough to catch their rambunctious rock will have had the previous day’s hangover knocked out of them within a few songs as the band tore through favourites old and new. A highlight of the set came when they announced “we’ve got friends too!” and brought out their own version hologram of Notorious B.I.G., but of course without the budget of Dre and Snoop the best they could afford was a life-size cardboard cut out of the man, which they made dance around the stage to his classic hit “Hypnotize.” It was a set packed with energy and excitement, particularly in songs such as “Modern Art” and “Bad Kids,” which really got day two off to a good start.

Azealia Banks

The Big Pink

The Head And The Heart

tUnE-yArDs

Andrew Bird

Andrew Bird enjoyed a set time on the outdoor stage around the time when the sun is still hot, but not so intense that you feel paralyzed by it, therefore he managed to create a sea of happy and buoyant people who were inspired to dance or shuffle around with his idiosyncratic indie pop music. As if there wasn’t already enough to look at onstage what with the stage adornments and spinning gramophones, Bird invited Annie Clark aka St. Vincent on to reprise her role from “Luisitania” off Bird’s latest record Break It Yourself. There were plenty of genuine Andrew Bird fans that could be seen and heard all around the crowd singing along to every word, and by the time Bird came to the last couple of songs he seemed to have them all skipping along with each pluck of his violin; they were eating out of his hands and completely loving every second of it.

Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds

Jeff Mangum

Jeff Mangum’s set this weekend was certainly one of my most anticipated, but I had no idea what to expect. Mangum doesn’t allow any photos or video to be taken of his performances, not even for the large screens to either side of the stage, so all eyes were focused on his physical being as he arrived on stage and promptly sat down and picked up a guitar. My initial feeling was that this arena was going to be difficult for a seated single man to conquer, but his attitude instantly created a sense of intimacy which was capitalized upon with early sing-alongs of “Holland, 1945” and “The King of Carrot Flowers.” A little further into the set the arrangements started to become a little more detailed as he was joined by several musicians that added French horn, trumpet, cello and more. “In The Aeroplane Over The Sea” was the singalong everyone was hoping for, but the highlight of the set was undoubtedly the magisterial “Oh Comely,” which saw Mangum in particularly fine form vocally. It’s a testament to the strength of the songs that even without any kind of stage show backing them they managed to captivate a festival audience.

St. Vincent

The Shins

There are a lot of mumbles around James Mercer’s The Shins and the fact that he’s the only remaining member from the days when they made their early albums, but in watching the band play it seems like this ensemble has been together for years. Kicking off with “Sleeping Lessons” the band perfectly wound up the audience with a quiet beginning that accelerated into a proper starter halfway through. Recent single “Simple Song” was heralded like a fan favourite, while the bouncy “No Way Down” went down nicely. “So Says I” and “New Slang” were a couple more old numbers that got excellent crowd reactions, but this current band setup is made to play the new songs, and it was these that were most enjoyable, particularly “It’s Only Life” and the impressive closer “Port Of Morrow.”

Feist

Bon Iver

Bon Iver’s current live show almost seems excessive; custom stage design, additional lights, two drummers and seven other musicians currently back Justin Vernon, but when the first hit of opening number “Perth” finally hits it all starts to make sense. Bon Iver’s current live set up is all about being as expansive sounding as possible, so cutting down their set list to make it fit a 50 minute set time meant an awful lot of big finales to songs. Although the old songs such as “Michicant” and “Holocene” were written this way and undoubtedly sounded incredible, it was the way that the older songs have been puffed up to fit this new sound that was most interesting. “Creature Fear” now features a full-throttle rock out finale, as does “Blood Bank,” while “Skinny Love” still centers around the power of one man and an acoustic guitar, but with plenty of extra back up singing (from the crowd as well as the band). “Beth / Rest” would not have been my ideal choice for closing song, but the relaxed atmosphere it brought over the crowd was impressive, and it left a decent impression.

Godspeed You! Black Emperor

SBTRKT

Radiohead

Even hours before Radiohead took to the stage it was already jam packed down the front of the audience, but this didn’t mean anything to some people who made things even more uncomfortable as they thrust forward after the conclusion of Bon Iver, making things even more uncomfortable. This discomfort was all forgotten about as soon as the band arrived and their spellbinding stage show hit with full effect. The opening segment focused mainly on recent material and the silhouette of Thom Yorke dancing around like the Pied Piper in front of the colourful lights, leading everyone down the strange paths of “Morning Mr. Magpie” and “Staircase.”

Radiohead are veterans of the live performance and they knew exactly how to control the flow of the evening, scaling back to less energetic songs at just the right moments – the Amnesiac double salvo of “Pyramid Song” and “You And Whose Army?” being a particular highlight. After more energy expended on old favourite “Kid A” and new jam “Lotus Flower,” it was time for Radiohead to remind us how they became the kings of festivals in the first place with a performance of “Karma Police” to which the audience rose magnificently to sing along.

Some fans in the audience may have been frustrated with the In Rainbows triplet of “House of Cards,” “Reckoner” and “Bodysnatchers” in the first encore, but the songs had as much vibrance as ever – particularly the final two. Anyone in the audience hoping to hear more 90s material cannot have complained after a second encore that closed out with a couple of OK Computer classics, “Exit Music” and “Paranoid Android,” both of which simultaneously brought fear and joy into the arena, so powerful was the performance with the light and video show combined.

This was Radiohead’s farewell to America for a little while and they took the opportunity to show once more why they are still the most sought after headline band for any festival in the world; it’s because they’re still the undisputed best.

As I trekked through the spitting rain in my search for Brooklyn’s Issue Project Room, I couldn’t help but think about how appropriate the nights bill was to accompany such an activity and setting. Julia Kent’s sweeping cello music, Jenny Hval’s foreboding intellectualisms and Julia Holter’s lush ambient inflected pop music each seemed an appropriate accompaniment for getting lost in the rain in an area that’s a bit sketchier than you’re used to. That’s not to say that Issue Project Room is off the beaten path–my sense of direction just isn’t what it should be. When I finally arrived at the ornate space for the opening night of Unsound Festival’s annual New York event, it became clear that these sets would be much more special than just appropriate accompaniment.

I wandered in just as Julia Kent was starting her set and her brand of ambient music set the tone for what would be a mesmerizing night. Though her entire set consisted simply looped cello over sparse beats, she was able to create some absolutely huge sounds out of this setup. Though minimal in nature, the sounds were large and sweeping, filling the space in a way that only ambient music has the ability to do. The majority of the crowd was seated, pondering the performance in folding chairs, and while I’m generally not the biggest proponent of seated shows, it certainly seemed to be the ideal way to take in Kent’s set. Sit down, zone out, absorb the swelling strings. It was an ideal start to the night to say the least.

Norway’s Jenny Hval took to the stage next. There’s really no pithy way that I can describe her set, but it was outstanding to say the least. Though the setup was limited to two guitars and a drums, she made some incredibly complex sounds. Though the setup might suggest it, these weren’t straightforward rock songs. Hval instead coaxed out of her instrument dense atmospherics and topped it off with her unique vocals that swept the dynamic range from gloriously melodic to a menacing sing-speak. Much of the material seemed drawn from her 2011 album Viscera, and the sexually charged lyrics therein took an even more impressive presence in a live setting. If Julia Kent’s onstage persona was mild and understated, Hval shocked and awed. It comes as no surprise that she comes from an art school background because that set, and this music seems of an intrinsically higher intellectual value than the music that her spare setup suggest.

Continuing the theme of minimal setups was the nights headliner Julia Holter who’s entire setup consisted of a piano and vocals. I’ve seen Holter once before accompanied by a drummer and cellist, and while that may have allowed her to stay closer to the studio arrangements of Ekstasis, the more minimal setup allowed the beauty of the the melodies to shine through above all. Stripped of the massive harmonies, tracks like “Marienbad” became even more haunting, “Moni Mon Amie” even more welcoming, “In The Same Room” even more beautiful. It’s rare that you’re treated to a whole set of songs reinterpreted in from their album versions, and this one was certainly worth it. It almost felt like this was the way that these songs were meant to be heard, as astounding as they are on record. It was captivating for the entirety of her all too short set.

In a world where we’re overrun by swaths of music on a daily basis, it’s rare to be able to take the time and appreciate it in a stripped down context, but last night, in this first event of Unsound Festival, that’s what we were allowed to do. It was something entirely moving, which is increasingly rare to be able to say after a series of sets of live music on a Wednesday night.

Photos by Philip Cosores

It’s not exactly the most revealing of realisations, but watching Bowerbirds play on Saturday night really emphasized to me how much having great musical chemistry between two people can enhance their personal connection, and vice versa. The break up and subsequent make-up between Bowerbirds’ co-leaders Philip Moore and Beth Tacular is an underlying theme in their fantastic new album The Clearing, and watching them play onstage this connection seemed to add more to their performance. They seemed so connected with each other that it made me think that when things had become tough between them, if they had stopped fighting verbally, and decided to have a conversation through instruments instead, the whole break up could have been avoided. Nevertheless, love always finds a way, and now the band is back together and all the stronger for it.

Opening band, Dry The River, also have a similar kind of connection, but as a friends-as-close-as-brothers way. The word has obviously spread about the London five-piece as the venue was fairly packed throughout their set. The five guys’ scruffy, unkempt appearance perfectly suited their bombastic folk style, and as they sung it was easy to imagine them as a pack of wandering nomads that like to go on dangerous adventures and then write songs of celebration to commemorate their triumphs. They have the loud-quiet dynamic down pat, and although the bursts of energy that generally herald the arrival of another grand chorus are the obvious peaks in their set, the true highlight came at the quietest moment of all when the guys stepped back from their microphones and sang a cappella in perfect harmony. The crowd was rapt with attention and you could have heard a pin drop at that point – a notable feat for an up and coming opening act from across the pond.

Bowerbirds decided to subvert the norm with the opening of their set, opting not to play a new song, nor a loud one, opting to go with “Hooves,” the quiet opening track from their debut album Hymns For A Dark Horse. Now, I admire the attempt, but unfortunately it didn’t quite work as there was plenty of chatter and the fragility of the song was somewhat dulled by this – it seems the band had to earn the quiet from the audience, as Dry The River had. On the other hand, those die-hard fans down the front probably blocked out all sounds except for those coming from the stage.

The show really got going a few songs in when Beth Tacular set her accordion aside and took up a new position behind the keyboard in order to play some new songs. The combination of “Walk The Furrows” and “Tuck The Darkness In” switched on anyone in the audience whose attention may have been lacking and for the rest of the set Bowerbirds gave them plenty of reasons for their attention to remain focused on them. Another new song, “Hush,” goes down as the best of the night in this writer’s humble opinion, as it saw the band starting off with the most plain of instrument combinations (violin and cello omitted), but with one of the most tricky-sounding arrangements, including a break down that saw four of the five members playing some sort of percussion. Plenty of these songs seemed to hold even more emotional weight in the live setting, so “This Year” made a nice, somewhat-lighthearted change of pace, but with songs as good as the regal “Chimes” on show, no complaints could be had that Bowerbirds’ set tended more towards the slow and mid-paced numbers.

As the beautiful dying notes of “Now We Hurry On” faded away it seemed like Bowerbirds had drawn the perfect line under their night’s performance, and if they had ended there everybody would have been satisfied. However, the band returned to perform a couple more; “Northern Lights,” which saw audience members mouthing along the words silently, and ultimately “Overcome With Light,” the most delicate song of the night, which was met with the crisp silence from the audience that they had undoubtedly earned with their performance. They seized the opportunity by the horns, and by the time we were leaving the venue not a single person could be said to have been unimpressed.