Liars - London Hippodrome - 14/10/06
2/5
By: JJ Florio
With this years Frieze Festival, a two-day celebration of left field music, being held at London's Hippodrome it is clear that the promoters of are not without a sense of irony. A venue that is otherwise home to Geezers, Birds and lost tourists being fed a sickly mix of mainstream confectionary, was for two days playing host to some of the most niche purveyors of modern sonic art (we'll bet security here had never seen so many skinny jeans, experimental haircuts and modestly dressed women.) One of the bands that are spearheading what could be described as a current "anti chorus" movement, and tonight's premier attraction, are new Berlin residents Liars.
Music is often extremely difficult to define in the written word, but in the case of Liars it is neon impossible. Here is a collective whose sound is so wildly chaotic, so atonal, so surreal that writing about it, is akin to cooking about sailing. Liars are certainly throwing up and disregarding many of the conventions of modern bands. And here is the real question: Is this a good thing?
Even though Liars create music that is evidently very structured, through a disregard for a sense of tonal centre, harmonic and rhythmic cohesiveness, the feeling is more one of free improvisation. Often to the accompaniment of repetitive tribal rhythms (sometimes played by two of the three members) a web of noise is spun that is as complex as it is irregular. In essence it's as if Liars have taken the individual elements that make up music, arranged them in a completely random manner leaving it to the listener to make whatever sense of it possible. Imagine a painter whom simply lays out the basic element of his art, colours, a blank canvass and brushes, leaving it solely to the observer to see the artistic possibilities.
This is truly cerebral music and demands much in the way of thought from the listener. Order, form, meaning are all qualities which must be deciphered by the individual. The experience can be engaging, but like being rapidly asked a series of challenging questions can also feel as if it's an intense inquisition. Like a cymbal that crashes to the ground because it has been stored precariously, Liars produce a noise that sometimes feels like the result of a series of unintentional coincides, at points during the set it felt like the band them selves were not actually in control of the chaotic sound produced.
It is strange that with such an ethos of experimentation, this night the sound Liars produce is surprisingly uninspired. All pioneers have, in the pursuit of originality gone against the grain of popular thinking but this said just to break rules is not to truly innovate. Here the lack of conventional form creates a seemingly "meaningless" landscape, one in which the very boundaries of what is valid as art become blurred. Some may see such ambiguity as a form empowerment, perhaps even innovation, but true inspiration may only occur when the band begin to deal themselves with the questions their art raises.
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