After more months of drum sessions in Garden City than I care to remember, the Factor Corp. - sans Robin, who was deservedly cavorting with her boyfriend - met at Birdcage for a meeting/listening session covering the drum recordings and edits thus far. We had not been in a room together for some time, and it was good to see everyone and catch up on life.
Reaction was largely upbeat, especially to "Our Faith," "Exist" and "Leningrad." "Our Faith" has the most work complete thus far, as it was the first edit I tackled using Ableton's Live, a stellar program for time correction. At best, however, the process is tedious. I could complete a song per day... if I were putting in a 12-hour day of editing. But real life shit means that I'm getting through a song about every three to four days, thereby making most of April editing time. Ugh.
The one point of contention came up during "Theme From Propaganda," Ash's Russian club monster with live bass and guitars. Robin played a staggered drum pattern over the 4/4 programming that I love, even in its unedited form, but that Ash and F hate on the basis that it makes the song too busy. I am standing by my opinion of the drums... for now. But the song is Ash's baby, so once I finish my edits this week, I will hand over the drum parts to him and let him make the final call.
Yesterday the band also had the opportunity to meet Kathie, my long-time photographer friend who will be shooting the Factor photos for the CD art and Web site. Kathie sat in on about half of the session, listening to us bicker and lending me cigarettes. And she was quite charmed by F and Ash, who have rubbed off on me, apparrently. I am not certain what this means, and Kathie did not care to elaborate, but I will assume this is a good thing.
Random aside: About half of the new Skinny Puppy album is amazing. Absolutely fucking amazing. Industrial may not be dead after all, if only the kids will rally to support this.
The evening before I caught the hipster gig of the year, Black Rebel Motorcycle Club and The Rapture in a double headlining stop at Roseland Ballroom. It was my first time seeing both bands, as I made the massive error of missing BRMC during their stops at Warsaw and Irving Plaza in 2003. The good: BRMC were stellar, and The Rapture sounded far more tuneful and coherent live than they do on their "breakthrough" LP, Echoes, revered by every white twentysomething in Brooklyn with an afro. The bad: The audience, which was exactly what you would expect at this gig. The worse: The vibe of both bands' best performances was ruined by the crowd's indifferent, muted response to everything. Shouldn't blistering performances of "Stop" and "Love Burns" warrant a bit more enthusiasm? I would think so.
The unexpcted: The audience popped the hardest for "Olio," "I Need Your Love" and a few other Rapture tunes with only electronics and drum machines. Strange, given the hipster crowd's fondness for sloppy guitars. And the ridiculous: The Rapture's Gabe Andruzzi, whose onstage antics proved that, unlike Blue Oyster Cult, his band does not need more cowbell.
Speaking of up-and-coming bands playing obnoxiously large and overhyped shows, seeing BRMC and The Rapture reminded me of why I didn't bother to see the Yeah Yeah Yeahs at Hammerstein Ballroom earlier in the year. As much as I adore this band, I cannot imagine their energy translating well in any venue larger than Irving Plaza. And at the risk of sounding like the elitists who selfishly want success to elude small bands, the point of all this is lost on me when gigs become hipster clusterfucks. A friend of mine put it best the other evening: "Damn, we were lucky to see them when we did."
No comments:
Post a Comment