A Musical Week

My concert attendance has been picking up in 2008. AC and I saw the Decemberists perform on January 31st and this week is even better.

On Sunday, Brooke, Birch and I headed to the Showbox for scratchy goodness. I arrived five minutes into Kid Koala’s opening set to find the crowd hooting and hopping, obviously pleased with his tight turntable work. I don’t really know how to describe DJ performances. Um, he was awesome? Koala had a standard two turntable setup with mixers between. The Showbox had cameras trained on his rig and projected behind him so we could see just how fast his fingers are.

He used “Moon River” quite well, citing it as his mother’s favorite song. Aw, such a sweetie:

Brooke got up quite close for a sweet shot of the superstar.

Then, THEN, at ten, we had our world rocked for two solid hours.

DJ Shadow and Cut Chemist performed The Hard Sell: eight (8) turntables, all 45 RPM original pressings, all manual, all awesome. This set was in the style of their original and somewhat groundbreaking BrainFreeze set from the late 90s. 45RPM records are smaller and harder to manipulate than standard vinyl, and are more difficult to procure, especially for well known tracks.

They took a bit to setup and eventually had records stacked up six or eight high, pulling them off and just keeping going, getting the crowd riled up. Within the first twenty minutes, when they layered the “Gilligan’s Island” theme vocals over “Stairway to Heaven” instrumental, I knew we were in for a treat.

And it just kept going. Sometimes they got a bit… technical? Cerebral? Brooke noted that the tight, consistent sound they were producing was commonplace in the age of laptops and electronica but quite a display of skill with only turntables and mixers. The crowd certainly approved, but no section more than the front right, which was particularly moved by old school hip hop samples (lots of De La Soul). They were so moved, in fact, that they were shaking the stage and caused Cut Chemist’s records to jolt, which only screwed him up once.

Cut Chemist was unreal, otherworldly even. I mean, DJ Shadow was fantastic but Cut Chemist’s skills seemed unparalleled. I need to find the Scratch documentary and watch it again. Their visuals were pretty sweet too (when we weren’t watching turntable-cam or DJ-Shadow-sleeve-cam), especially the 3D animated jukebox robot blowing up flying iPods.

So, they built to a huge, jiving climax and pulled the set to a close but started talking about how Seattle loves its rock, and its metal, and then gave us a rare treat. They scratched a rendition of Metallica’s “One” on portable, battery-powered turntables. Ridiculous: the crowd went nuts.

Now, I have to run away from my office and get home to Sarah, whom I am taking to see Mika! Tonight! I AM SO EXCITED. Her good sir Charlie is out of town (playing Ultimate in Hawaii) so we get to celebrate Happy Heart Day together.

I will report on Mika, and their opener, The Midway State, tomorrow. Cheers!