From KaisrSolze Sent Sun, May 10th 1998, 20:57
From KaisrSolze Sent Sun, May 10th 1998, 20:57
The indie rock glasses were out in force for this show... =09First off, let me say that the criticism of Oval's live show is somewh= at=0Aunwarranted. His music is meant to slowly roast the brain, not to f= ry it.=0AEven though it isn't background music, it takes a certain kind o= f extended,=0Aconcentrated listening for it to sink in =97 the repetition= and underlying=0Astructure builds up gradually, so there's no immediate = gratification. That's=0Aexactly what happened with his live set =97 the = degree of interest each song=0Aheld was directly tied to how interesting = the sounds Popp chose for each one=0Awere. Some were really cool =97 a n= oisey burst of static formed the core of=0Aone, the bells from the 1st tr= ack on Dok made up another. However, even the=0Abest tracks fell into th= e Oval formula =97 they were abrasive enough to force=0Ayou to pay attent= ion on some level, but not varied enough to give any sort of=0Arush. And= i think that's fine =97 Popp was able to make some people really=0Auncom= fortable, some people really bored, and force others to concentrate and= =0Atry to understand what he was trying to accomplish. I think his set w= ould=0Ahave been much more effective if it had gone on for a few more hou= rs (not that=0Aanyone would have liked it more, but a lot more time was n= eeded for his music=0Ato really sink in). Anyway, the last track was rea= lly a good one =97 he started=0Aout with some human voices, and kept on l= ayering on the effects, until after a=0Afew minutes they were only a smal= l part of the song's fabric. For the first=0Atime in the entire set Popp= drove home his point to almost everybody in the=0Aaudience, even those w= ho had tried to resist earlier. =09I liked Tortoise's set too, but I didn't love it nearly as much as eve= rybody=0Aelse seems to. The rhythm section was great, and everybody seem= ed to get=0Aenergy from the drummer. However, when they tried to quiet t= hings down or=0Adrop out the percussion and improvise, i think the music = lost any sense of=0Adirection. the guys in Tortoise are great musicians,= I just don't think=0Athey're good improvisers. Also, and this is just a= personal beef, i can't=0Astand the damn vibes. All of their melody seem= ed to come from the vibes, or=0Afrom guitars being played to sound like v= ibes =97 everything was clean, not=0Anoisy at all (the only rough edge ca= me from the drummer), and the melodies=0Awere just too simple. The bell= tones of the vibes are nice as accouterment,=0Abut they don't do a thing= for me as lead instruments. I left early because i=0Awas tired, and bec= uase i felt like 50 minutes of Tortoise had shown me=0Aeverything they ha= d to offer (at the NYC show, how did it go after they played=0Athe song f= rom their first album?) Sam=0A