SBTRKT and Cubic Zirconia @ Music Hall of Williamsburg 11.1.11

Aaaaaaaarooooooooon! and Sampha 

Truth be told, we get blasted into hyperspace quite often at shows. Our addiction to this feeling is what keeps us attending concerts despite ourselves. So after a night of mind-melting dance madness hosted by SBTRKT we had a change of heart: there's no use in planning to skip shows and save money next year.
Hell, we can't even sit out on an opener when planned if the music moves us.

NYC's own Cubic Zirconia's got us up off the floor and shimmying with timbale-happy disco house bangers. Once we caught wind of what was happening on stage, the sassy singer Tiombe Lockhart won our approval. Fearless and sensual, it was difficult to keep your eyes off her. She reminded us of Buraka Som Sistema's resident dancing queen Blaya but left much booty shaking to be desired. We'll chalk it up to her dress being too tight for her to get down harder than she did. Shit did get dark real quick for the last track, a rocking finale with Lockhart rightfully screaming her ass off. It was totally out of left for CZ virgins like ourselves but cool all the same.

Our own cool was lost upon catching the dynamic duo that makes up SBTRKT live set up their stations. Seeing Aaron Jerome and Sampha slay at this summer's MoMA PS1 WarmUp did little to prepare us for the craziness of a proper headlining show. A short set sandwiched between acts in broad daylight was great but there's a different quality to the energy of headlining the night and we couldn't be more psyched about the possibilities.

After a brief introduction from Mr. Jerome, the guys went head first into "Heatwave" while we plunged into insanity from the sound. The sold-out crowd moved to tricked out versions of songs from SBTRKT's out-of-this-world self titled debut. Sampha's sweet yet melancholy honey-rich voice got the best of us during "Trails of the Past" and "Something Goes Right," grooving as we wept inside. The particularly awesome Drake mix of "Wildfire" and a sick extended mix of our favorite "Pharaohs" (which they didn't play the first time we saw them) were no cause for tears but a dream come true, it was absolutely mental. Also thrown in the loop was new-to-our-ears title track from the equally euphoric Step in Shadows EP. I kicked myself after listening to this live since the EP has been sitting in my computer for weeks, untouched. Currently it's all I listen to. Snail said it's better we didn't listen to the EP before or we'd whine about how they didn't play more of it. She had a point.

All night, Aaron jumped from drums to theremin to mixers and laptop like a mad scientist, frenetically fetching the right test tubes for this surreal dance experiment he and Sampha were conducting on the audience. The result was a hallucinogenic experience that left us all crazy for more. After a stunning encore with "Never, Never" and a purchasing of the vinyl, we left on a high. Refusing to believe it was over we were forced to ask "Where's the afterparty?" To our delight they're to return for Phase II of the experiment in March and we're counting the days! --Cheep

Photo from SBTRKT's Seattle date by David Lichterman

Metronomy / Class Actress / Caged Animals / True Womanhood @ Music Hall of Williamsburg 10.20.11

With CMJ madness in full swing, we came out of hiding from it for our first  Metronomy show at MOHW. On this night the British band was the epitome of light-hearted fun, adorableness and, dare I say it, quirk.

Below borderline creepy painted portraits, hometown-proud mastermind Joseph Mount and co. brought his addictive dance pop ditties to life to a sold-out crowd, the jovial energy of the studio recording amplified tenfold. Metronomy got the place pulsating, much like the bulbs on their tops, to the beat of our favorite danceables like "Heartbreaker," "Love Underlined," "The Bay" and "A Thing for Me." The main set closed with the slow simmer of "Some Written" though the night ended after a two-song encore: starting with the sweetness of "Everything Goes My Way" and ending with a massive power up via "Radio Ladio."

On the stage, we admired from afar Oscar Cash's multi-instrumental awesome (epic sax, ftw!) and drummer Anna Prior playing like a crazy, working a green sequin catsuit like we never could. As mad lovers of Metronomy's low-end, the man of the night was bassist (and impeccable dresser) Gbenga Adelekan. This dude has been grooving from the womb and the evidence is in his infallible bringing of the funk.

It would have been an absolute flawless first time if we weren't in the back with the least enthusiastic part of the audience. Luckily, Joseph announced their return is set for March and we can indulge in a dancey do-over next year. --Cheep

Photo via

Death from Above 1979/The Drums @ Williamsburg Waterfront 7.22.11

Photo by Vincent Cornelli via BrooklynVegan

It's a rare thing when divorced parents get back together. Once upon a time, it was just as rare for a band to do the same but now it seems like many are making up and taking their show on the road once again.

In 2006, Death from Above 1979 left fans grieving the loss of the powerhouse duo and the missed chance to dance and mosh in the name of sexy music. A reunion and tour announcement earlier this year gave us new hope. DFA 1979 lovers, experienced or virgin, like us, were vowing not to miss them -- no matter what. Snail got her chance first at Sasquatch! Morrissey and I got tickets to their NYC show. Our date, the hottest day of a three-day heatwave, came with a high risk factor but it couldn't stop us, we rode that shit all the way to Williamsburg Waterfront.  

After a sweaty bus ride that brought me back to packed and swamp-assed bus rides in the third world tropics and cool redemption at Wild Ginger for dinner, we arrived to The Drums' pleasant indie pop ditties and found a nice spot near the stage. Sweaty and gross again, I tried to fight the urge to sway to their sweet beat as to not provoke my sweat glands further. Even though I was only familiar with "Best Friend" from their self-titled, I liked all of it, especially the new songs from Portamento, and a few sways escaped me anyway.

The sun had lost some power by their end but it was still too hot most people stood as far from each other as possible, reserving whatever time they had in anticipation for the potential body heat massacre that was to be during DFA's set.

People slowly began to migrate closer the the stage as Fugazi, AC/DC and At the Drive-In blared through the speakers.  A mini-sing-along broke out during ATDI's "One Arm Scissor" bouts where we stood and that made me happy. The headliner's banner soon fell, an amazing piece of black and white art featuring the guys' elephant-trunked zombified alter egos creeping up from behind their gravestone, engraved "DFA 1979 2001-2006," and everyone screamed. This was not a hallucinatory side effect of heatstroke, our boys were back from the dead.

All anxiousness from waiting abated, excitement and cheers reigned as Jesse F. Keeler and Sebastien Grainger hit the stage in ebony and ivory respectively, Sebby sporting a weird but ultimately very becoming bleach blonde moptop. We danced and thrashed -- some physically, others mentally -- and swooned over the Canadian hotnesses during our beloved songs, mostly from their Heads Up EP and album You're a Woman I'm a Machine. During the breaks, Sebastien asked if we were okay and riffed, telling joke after joke like a rookie comedian at his first open mic. He was hilarious, as usual. 

The heat was definitely affecting the level of crazy among the masses. We came into this mostly fearing that we were going to be eaten alive by a moshing mob but though a decent mosh pit got started, people seemed to care more about making through the show than risking their lives going hard in the pit. It was so hot, many guys and gals either walked out of it or reserved their cr00sh moments of their favorite jams.

After the end of the set, we cheered the men back on to the stage for an a two-song encore, apparently Sebastien didn't think we were going hard enough. “Mom and Dad get back together and that’s all you got?” he said and garnered our best roar -- or rather the best we could do as sunbeaten as we were -- and played us out with personal faves "Losing Friends" and "If We Don't Make It We'll Fake It."

As we walked out into the streets of North Brooklyn, we could hear people crossing this event off their bucket lists through the massive exodus. We hope Mom and Dad continue to ride the ecstasy of their make up sex well into their ancient years but if that's not the case at least we got to experience their legend first hand, at least once.

For setlist and more pics check out BrooklynVegan

Foster the People/Gardens & Villa @ Music Hall of Williamsburg 6.20.11

Photo by Greg Notch

As far as we're concerned summa-summa-summatime officially started one day before the solstice: A perfect sunny day punctuated by a great Wild Ginger dinner al fresco and fun courtesy of some of the sunshine state's finest dancey pant movers, Foster the People and Gardens and Villa's at Music Hall of Williamsburg.

We entered the venue, relieved to only have one opener between us and Foster the People with figurative fingers crossed hoping -- as usual -- the opening band would be on the right side of awesome. And boy did the Wizard make it so.

It was love at first listen with Santa Barbara's Gardens & Villa. The Michael Jackson loving band inspired major body rattles from us with a sound that features the best of 60s pop, 80s new wave and today's indie rock. Snail was half-way to loosing control of her bodily functions burning love holes into the MJ sweatshirt wearing multi-instrumentalist cutie on stage right, unable to remove her stare from his fancy footwork behind the keyboard.

We grooved to the tunes of their summery self-titled debut ourselves including now favorites "Spacetime," "Black Hills," "Cruise Ship" and "Star Fire Power" and wrapped it up with a cover of Gary Numan's synth hit "Cars." So impressed we were that we rushed to the merch booth immediately after their set for a copy of the album, on sale in advance of its July 5th release date. Listening that night at home we realized the album doesn't hold a candle to their live performance.

We discovered Foster the People via footage of an explosive set at SXSW and have come prefer the high-energy renditions of the jams from first LP, Torches on the stage to the less exciting studio versions. Of course, we were now super stoked to finally bear witness to their power punch of a live show in the flesh.

The LA band burst onto the stage in no time, flashing through the contents of Torches. They played on and on at full tilt, looking super adorable and happy as heck stopping only a few words of thanks and a shout out to a ticket giveaway winner who impressed the band with an interpretive dance on YouTube.
We danced on and on to the likes of "Hustling," "Don't Stop" and "Broken Jaw," annoyed "sexy" girls in process, only coming to a full stop to rest during epic mushfest "I Would Do Anything For You."

The magic came to close with encore, and certified rump shaker, "Helena Beat." Everyone went nuts.
We exited eager to rehydrate with some coconut water but not so much to start the trek back home, happy to have kicked off summer with this craziness and equally sad because it came and went so fast. Then we're all smiles again because we'll be getting down to FTP once again this summer when they open for Cut Copy in August at Celebrate Brooklyn. Hells. Yes!

Gang Gang Dance/New Moods @ Music Hall of Williamsburg 05.04.11

Photo above by Jason Lester

While everyone else was enjoying Foals in Manhattan, we ventured Brooklyn-ward to catch Gang Gang Dance's headlining show at Music Hall of Williamsburg.

The opening DJs did us wrong by spinning reggaeton and Chris Brown in a confusing mish-mashing of the good with the bad and ultimately losing us all together.

New Moods was a step up but would've been more enjoyable if their opening song didn't drag on forever and the rest of the set sounded like the one atmospheric Zola Jesus-y thing they did.

In no time we were tripping the light fantastic to Gang Gang Dance's psychedelic percussion party.

The set list, comprised of mostly tracks from their amazing fifth album, Eye Contact, was something to the effect of "Adult Goth," "House Jam," "Glass Jar," "MindKilla" -- give or take a song or two -- plus an encore. Highlight of the night was definitely the "MindKilla" jam sesh, starting out more stripped down than the album version but gave way to a rump-shakin' drum-heavy extended mix that left nothing more to be desired and culminated in a crush on drummer, Jesse Lee.

This band has been tearing up the fabric of electronic beats and cross-genre experimentation for years, playing their brand of dance all over NYC. This was the first time we were able to catch them doing their shit, legit, it was great to see them perform at their seasoned best.

Warpaint/Rewards/Family Band @ Music Hall of Williamsburg 12.02.10

Day two of December-appropriate swooning over dreaminess that makes us feel all kinds of warm inside commenced with Warpaint at the Music Hall of Williamsburg.

After eating a blissful dinner and getting peanut butter bombed at our favorite veg joint on Bedford, Wild Ginger we walked with bellies full (maybe a little too full) to the venue.

Got in early enough to see Family Band open up the show. They had a sedating, Mazzy Star quality to them: slow and oft times twangy guitars, melancholic almost monotone vocals but no umph. There seemed to be lack of sexy from the rhythm section (guess we been spoiled by Jenny Lee and Stella's magic combo, haha). Overall, they're a good band just weren't the flavor we savored at the moment. Snail fell victim to nail-biting anxiety because their songs felt sooo drawn out and sad. All we wanted were our hearts tickled!

Brooklyn band Rewards came out and got that engine running with a more upbeat, new wavey indie pop sound with an adorable singer who cooed into his mic, danced about the stage a bit and loved everybody. People were dicks to them and they were good sports. Fuck da hataz. Their set was really short compared to Family Band but maybe it felt that way because we enjoyed them more.

Warpaint came on stage to an enthusiastic and diverse (a hefty amount of brown peeps representing, finally!) full house. Setlist as follows (this is roughly the order of things): Bees. Stars. Composure. Undertow. Majesty. Burgundy (extended w/jam sesh). Warpaint. Elephants. Encore: Beetles (extended w/ jam sesh).

They were mesmerizing to watch. We swooned over our crushes Jenny Lee and Emily. Snail and I expressed our song love uniquely. I went wild over favorites: "Warpaint," "Burgundy" and "Elephants." Snail took leave of dancing for a lot of the show for fear of ralphing (damn you, peanut butter bomb and your irresistible goodness!) but let loose during "Beetles" as a last hurrah. In a A-train confession she told me the waterworks went on auto during her bittersweet jammy, "Undertow."

These ladies have a great dynamic: On the stage they're artful musicians who take what they do seriously, the quality of their output is imperative but equally don't take themselves too seriously. They fool around on stage, dance funny, kiss each other. It's evident they're having the time of their lives playing great tunes with their best friends every night. Nothing superficial seems to take precedent with them, it's extremely refreshing. They act how they want, dress how they want, they just don't give a shit what anyone thinks and we love them so much because of this.

We left the venue feeling all fuzzy and full of love, floating home -- Snail with her first vinyl purchase, Warpaint's The Fool, in hand with the most prize-winning smile I've seen on her in days -- sighing and singing praises over how awesome our birthday month has already been two days in.

Modeselektor/Falty DL @ Music Hall of Williamsburg 9.26.10

Modeselektor always keeps it fresh.

The Cheep and the Snail have seen the German producers 4 times and each time has been a different kind of party.

We walked into a techno trip out about 10pm with FaltyDL behind the laptop. We assumed our positions on the balcony and looked for characters in the crowd. There were your basic dysrhythmic dancers that garnered a giggle or two but not one topped our darling hand twirler Sweatpants. To our sadness he did not make it to this shindig as far as our eyes could see. So our only entertainment proved to be Falty's twitchy arm freak-outs during specific beat drops and break downs. Who says DJs are boring to watch?

Liars/Fol Chen @ Music Hall of Williamsburg 4.18.10

Liars via The Owl Mag

For a Sunday night, Williamsburg was suspiciously happening. People already drunk and wandering by 6pm, ah life in the big city.

After arriving early from a nice dinner at Bite with some good friends, the Terrible Three walked through the hipster-filled Bedford Ave. to kill time before the show. The cold night made us call it quits so we headed to the venue and were one of the first ones there, as usual.  Our early-bird syndrome resulted in us snagging primo mosh-safe area by the rails. Liars' shows are usually fucking crazy, being on the floor may have equaled us getting squished...potentially losing shoes or limbs so we were stoked on these spots.

LA band Fol Chen opened. They're the kind of band that sounds better live than on record. Unfortunately, their singer ruins the band like that one guy from Silversun Pickups ruins them.
When Liars came out, as predicted, people got pumped and became progressively moshy. We admired the madness comfortably rocking out from the sidelines. That is, when we weren’t swooning over the band on stage.

Singer Angus Andrew was endearingly tall and awkward, dancing and contorting and pumping the crazies up. Multi-instrumentalist Aaron Hemphill so unassuming, who knew such pawnk rockness would exude from such pleated khakis? haha. My love for drummer Julian Gross blossomed just watching that man work...so fast!

The set, though badass, was less than two hours and left us hungry for more. They played mostly tracks from Sisterworld, including favorites "Scissor" and "No Barrier Fun." I was bummed they didn't sneak "Mr. You're On Fire, Mr." in but it's understandable since it sounds like nothing they've released since.
Since we don’t listen to the band on the regular, we were worried about not having as much fun at this gig. I don’t necessary know all the lyrics and Snail thought she never assimilated anything any of the times she listened to them (she had). All that worrying was for nothing because it ruled hard all the same. Like Snail said, anyone who loves music as hard as we do could have loved that show even if it was their first time listening to them. Yes, it ruled that hard. It ruled so hard we want to do it again, and again and again.

The band recorded this show for a live album you can purchase here.
Watch more videos from the show here