So me and my friend Baby Diego went to see The Books last night at Babylon on Bank St. Not the best venue, as anyone who has attended Babylon can attest to, but the show was highly enjoyable.
The night began with a set by Greg Davis, who is what one could describe as a 'Noise Artist'. He set up his gear (which consisted only of a keyboard and a laptop) on the ground in front of the stage, took off his shoes, sat down cross-legged and began his set. The first five minutes of the 'song' consisted of one note (I think it was a low A) which reverberated through the venue with a visceral hum. The hard-core noise art hipsters sat cross-legged around Davis and it kind of felt like I was witnessing some sort of seance or spiritual meditation. After a while he started messing with some knobs and recording voice loops on his computer, creating some awesome soundscapes (that's right, I used the word soundscapes). I was definitely impressed by the creativity of his set. I can appreciate that many music listeners would classify his set simply as 'noise' rather than 'noise art' but I respect what he's throwing out there. Art is art.
The Books started their set with an ode to the alphabet, and that sort of set the tone for the rest of the show. The two members of the band, one on guitar and the other on cello, played along with home videos that were being projected on a screen behind them. The Books rely heavily on 'found sound' for much of their material, taking clips from obscure videos from the 70's and 80's and incorporating them into an accessible sonic collage. Jokes are thrown into the mix and the overall effect is highly entertaining. The whole show can apparently be bought as a DVD which I'm sure would be just as fun to watch. So, if you've never heard The Books and you're willing to take the big step from indie music to noise art I suggest checking out thebooksmusic.com But then, you may be the type of person who thinks that things like melody, changing chords, and lyrics are passé, in which case go to myspace.com/gregdavismusic. Just make sure you don't start acting like you're better than everyone just because you 'get it'.
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2 comments:
sam town was the only reason that I got a blog page, so that I could rip them pubically. Let the great experiment begin!!!
Hey Tristan,
Sweet blog. The Books are awesome, though I don't think they're entirely noise-art... there are still bits of melody and rhythm in their stuff. I've been thinking about starting a new noise art project myself, actually. It's going to be called "The Pauses", and it's going to be music composed of recordings of nothing but the pauses between people's words.
-Bryce
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