Frieze 2006 - London Hippodrome - 14/10/06
4/5
By: Charlie Potter
UPSET THE RHYTHM! UPSET THE RHYTHM! UPSET THE RHYTHM! UPSET THE RHYTHM! UPSET THE RHYTHM! UPSET THE RHYTHM! UPSET THE RHYTHM! UPSET THE RHYTHM!
Upset The Rhythm, then. They're the best promoters in London. I always knew this, but this incredible 2 day event (of which this was the second night) has sealed the accolade. If all genres had a promoter this good, then the music world would be exactly as it should be. The Hippodrome just off of Leicester Square is a fantastic underused venue - they sell food, have tables, the sound is great and you can view the bands from all sorts of different levels and vantage points. Plus, thanks to the UTR guys, once in a while something like this happens there.
What sort of person leaves Deerhoof to make his side project the main project? And what sort of project is that going to be? Well, apparently the genius behind Deerhoof is just that sort of person, and the kind of project is The Curtains, who themselves are (whisper it) about as good as Deerhoof.
The sheer amount of bands that have a high degree of timbric consideration and play on the interrelation of instruments has led me to be guilty of the overuse of the term 'free jazz', so for this band I've had to come up with a new term, for which 'pop free rock' will suffice. Look out for it kids, I'm gonna make this catch on. Sod 'new rave'. People are already talking about 'free folk', and soon it will be this, my own genre. Why not just 'free rock' or 'free pop rock'? Well, 'free rock' would be a lot heavier and weirder, and 'free pop rock' would either be an oxymoron or it would be a totally terrifying insanity. I mean, imagine all the instruments of the Television Personalities separated out onto different CD's and then played at once in broken CD players. Sheer terror.
But what you have with The Curtains is fantastic complex pop melodies interlaced with explorative intimate jitters. Sometimes the melodies gel together perfectly, but you can often see the smile on the guitarists face when something is just a little bit out, which is often his own vocals. All this makes it sound a bit discordant and heavy going, but what a lot of soft fluffy pop fans don't understand is that not only does discordant music not have to sound aggressive or maddening, but it can often be comforting and sensitive - and that includes deliberately off key singing.
One of our other writers was recently telling me how much he liked articulate pop. Well, never mind articulate pop - Barr is pure articulation. Barr's band are back in California, meaning that he's left with backing music which he claims is coming from his coat.
Barr is a totally hyperactive Californian, which might mean for some people they can't get past his annoying voice, but predictably those people are missing out. If you forget his irritating tone for just a few seconds, you'll realise he has a lot of interesting things to say, or rather a lot of interesting things to talk about. Because, as much as Barr covers all manner of subjects running from tangent to tangent in his scarcely melodic borderline prose/poetry, he seldom seems to reach any definite conclusions to the multitude of questions he is asking. Rather than detracting from his eventual goal, it only adds to the charm that is the bizarre confusion pieced together from seemingly definite observations.
One of the more interesting and unusual topics that he comes back to a couple of times is the general questioning of why indeed we're listening to his music, and what it means to listen to a single (specifically, his upcoming one). Chins are stroked.
Amazingly, Erase Errata have realised something that many bands fail to realise, and what that thing is I haven't quite realised myself, but I think it has something to do with their relentlessly visceral, brutish live sets, and definitely a lot to do with how brilliant they are. It's always good to see a band where every member seems to be more than pulling their weight. You're drawn into impossibly trying to choose a favourite, but the band just make you realise that too many bands have taggers on.
Erase Eratta prove there are still a lot of brilliant melodies out there with only 2 notes yet to be discovered, but this wouldn't be possible if it wasn't for their varying and unconventional approaches to rhythm. Amongst all their energy and rough rock fun, they still manage to be quite clever in the way that they write rhythmic melodies and the way the instruments compliment each other. Not a gimmick in sight, and we could ask for nothing more.
Over the last year, it seems Liars morphed from being a great band into an entity unto themselves. The totally weird, utterly amazing live shows, you'll be pleased to hear, have followed suit. Liars evoke a kind of aesthetic that is sorely missing in the music world. How and indeed if this translates into words I think would vary for every fan, but the imagery it conjures for me is a cross between the inevitable end of everything and a hideous giant beast from the forest. Except bigger than you're thinking.
Sceptics may claim that this is down to the visuals, the lighting and the crazy dancing, and although they are all the more enjoyable for this (why indeed shouldn't they do all these entertaining things?), the music is by no means normal. Without getting too geeky about it, there are aren't many rock bands that bring 2 mixers and a vintage sampler out on stage and have a member stringing his guitar with what seemed to be 4 bottom Es.
Most of what they play is from the amazing 'Drum's Not Dead' album, filling the sound with operatic yet sparse barrages of percussion forced through abused effects units, simple slow melodies coming from the guitar which by the time they reach your ear only just sound like a guitar at all. All with Angus Andrew's creepy cold voice over the top.
There's some music played that's yet to be released, and it sounds very promising, if rather similar to the work on 'Drum...'. I've only seen Liars twice myself, and both times they have not only played amazing sets but have played brilliant, necessary encores. One time, they got the Blood Brothers out to perform a song they claimed to write in Seattle in 1992, which turned out to be 'Territorial Pissings' by Nirvana, of course, except with more people on every last instrument. This time, they played a couple of the more prominent tracks from 'They Were Wrong, So We Drowned' including the incredible 'There's Always Room on the Broom', which they nailed.
In short, see this band. In long, see this band before you die, as seems to be the fashion at the moment.
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