So that this doesn't become just another post about the covid-19 coronavirus, here are a couple new songs by the band Purity Ring.
While you're enjoying the songs, I regret to inform you that just today it's been announced that because of the pandemic, Atlanta's Shaky Knees festival is being postponed until October, Tennessee's Bonnaroo festival is being rescheduled to September, and England's Glastonbury festival was cancelled outright.
To make room on their warehouse shelves for toilet paper and hand sanitizer, Amazon announced that they are going to stop selling vinyl records among other discretionary items.
On a happier note, direct-to-musician digital retailer Bandcamp announced that to help support musicians struggling during the lock-down, they will be waiving their revenue share this Friday (March 20). So you may want to consider that date if there's any music you've been meaning to DL. Hint: Porridge Radio's Every Bad is currently going for $10 digital, $13 CD, and $20 vinyl on Bandcamp, and since they can't do a promotional tour for the new album because of Trump's travel band (they're from the UK and besides, the clubs and other venues are all closed), buying their new album would be a good way to support them.
Here's another new song by Purity Ring (who aren't on Bandcamp).
"Who's kids are these?" I wondered at one point during last night's show at the Buckhead Theater. I could have been asking about the young audience at the all-ages show, but in fact I was wondering about the opener, Alberta's Born Gold.
I did not care for their set. The sound was all muddled together with the bass way too loud, the synthesized rhythm sounded like a pair of sneakers in a clothes dryer, and the band seemed more interested in choreographed dance moves than playing music. Worse, they played most of their set on a dark stage except for the lights from their keyboards, with occasional bursts of light (I caught one for the picture below), usually to capture their dance moves. They weren't hurt-your-ears bad or I'll-never-unhear-this bad, just these-guys-need-to-practice-playing-their-instruments-more bad. It was hard for me to understand how a band of that caliber could have earned the a spot on a national tour with Braids and Purity Ring, and I figured that they must have been somebody's kids - thus, "Who's kids are these?"
I learned the answer today - Born Gold is the band that used to go by the name Gobble Gobble and used to contain Corin Roddick, now of Purity Ring. They're the guys he left behind, so in a sense, they got the gig because they're Purity Rings's kids. Anyway, their set was a mercifully short 30 minutes, so enough about them - I don't like being negative and subscribe to the "if you don't have anything nice to say" philosophy of blogging, but this was just too much to not comment on.
Next up were Montreal's Braids, who were absolutely fantastic. We saw Braids once before when they opened for Wye Oak, and we were totally blown away then. Oddly, that performance brought Purity Ring to mind, and now, almost exactly a year later, here that are again, now opening for Purity Ring themselves.
Still, we weren't prepared for how great Braids were. Front-woman Raphaelle Standell-Preston's vocals soared at times, startled at others, and had my complete attention throughout. They have a new album, Deep In The Iris. out, but even the outstanding cuts from the record don't match the immediacy and range of Raphaelle's live vocals. By all means, if you have a chance to catch this band, do.
I don't know if the show had sold out or not, but the Buckhead Theater was packed. I got there a few minutes after the doors had opened, but there were already at least ten rows of people at the front of the stage. I fell back a little and watched the show from the front row of the elevated portion of the floor, still close enough to see well, but also high enough to see over the heads of the crowd. Unfortunately, the young audience around me were not talking to one another throughout the set, they were shouting at one another throughout the set. Totally oblivious to the great music on the stage, they were both preventing others from hearing it and also interfering with the atmosphere the band was attempting to create. "Who's kids are these?"
They finally did shut up for Purity Ring, or Purity Ring managed to drown them out, but after all, Purity Ring was the band they had come to see, not some band called "Braids."
We've seen Purity Ring twice before, first during MFNW (RIP) 2012 and then again at Variety Playhouse. Since those performances, Purity Ring's stagecraft has gotten even more visually compelling, even if their songs have not changed much. Their latest album, Another Eternity, has a glossier, more commercial sound than their debut, but live the songs sound more evenly matched.
Singer Megan James has a limited range, and after a while, she sounds like she's squeaking her way through every one of the songs, while instrumentalist Corin Roddick, formerly of Gobble Gobble, keeps the booming, bass-heavy beats going behind the vocals. It's a formula that works, and the audience reacted favorably throughout the set, arm-pumping and phone-waving the whole time.
Megan announced near the end of Purity Ring's set that for some reason there would be no encore, and true to her words, as soon as the last song was over right at 11:00 pm, the lights came on and the house music started. A few people called for "One more!," but no one ever came back on stage.
I don't know if I need to go to another Purity Ring show again unless they start to come up with something new, but the evening was still totally worth it for Braids' fine performance, even if it did mean enduring Born Gold's set.
In case you were one of the few people not there, there was a wonderful show last evening at Atlanta's Variety Playhouse, featuring the bands Young Magic and Purity Ring.
Opener Young Magic is an artsy collective based in Brooklyn, although its members hail from Australia and Indonesia. Melati Melay sings and plays electric guitar, while Isaac Emmanuel and drummer Michael Italia provide pounding, tribal backbeats, along with many electronic flourishes.
While they performed, a video projector cast intriguing images against a screen in front of Italia's station. Although they were hard to see from my vantage point, the images included whirling Dervishes, pages from the Koran, and mesmerizing scenes from the band's videos, such as this one for Drawing Down The Moon, which looks like what might happen if Peter Greenaway were chosen to direct a Ron Fricke movie.
Frankly, their combination of dream pop, trip-hop, electro, and tribal influences came as quite a pleasant surprise to me, and I look forward to hearing more from them in the future.
The headliners were Montreal's Purity Ring. We last saw Purity Ring performing a daytime show in Portland's Doug Fir Lounge during MFNW, and fortunately their show last night was just as memorable as that performance.
Purity Ring were named Pitchfork’s Best New Band of 2011 and the Best New Band at CMJ 2011 before even releasing their first album, last year's Shrines. The duo of Megan James and Corin Roddick play homemade instruments and reportedly even makes their own clothing to wear during their shows.
The duo is in the avant garde of hip-hop's invigorating advance into pop music. According to Portland's Willamette Weekly, "You have heard the purple-drunk, stumbling beats of chopped-and-screwed hip-hop. You have heard the catchy hooks and pristine vocals of electro-pop. You have not, however, heard the two together—until you've heard Purity Ring." They really don't sound like anyone else, and I couldn't imagine a band like this existing before about, say, 2008.
But what really stands out at a Purity Ring show is their stage. Playing beneath suspended lanterns (I counted 19) that look at various times like Chinese lamps, ant eggs, Tic Tacs, or some sort of pupae, their set also includes a bass drum that lights up when struck, and several smaller lamps around Roddick's keyboards that also light and emit tones when struck. It's easily the most beautiful stage on any body touring today, and almost becomes a third performer in the band.
Due in large part to the striking visual element of their show, the band has been extensively covered by music blogs and last night's show was sold out. The young crowd enthusiastically reacted to the band's every move, with several young men at the front of the stage continually reaching out to the band for who knows what.
In addition to playing the songs from Shrines, Purity Ring covered Soulja Boy's Grammy. They also brought out Young Magic's Isaac Emmanuel to sing his part on their song Grandloves.
Here's the video for their song Lofticries (the first song of theirs that I heard, and still a favorite):
The set ended somewhat abruptly when Megan James announced that their next song will be the last, as that's all they have. No chance for an encore, no chance to show our love, and as soon as the last song ended, the house lights came on and the crowd wandered out into a cold North Georgia night.
Okay, so it's not the end of the Winter Doldrums, but it's something at least. Portland's Ramona Falls, the project of ex-Menomena member Brent Knopf, will be coming February 15 to the godforsaken Masquerade, playing the miniscule room, Purgatory. The room may be small, but at least you don't have the bands playing upstairs in Heaven thundering over your heads.
So the path out of the Winter Doldrums looks like this, if I can make it another month:
