Monthly Archives: May 2010

[Photo courtesy of John Ruscher with nyctaper favorites Eardrum NYC]

Whoa.  The first few times I saw Woods, I enjoyed it – I have a soft spot for their particular brand of folkish, ramshackle psychedelia.  Back then, the band came across onstage much as they did on record, as a very DIY affair.  Which is not to say they were unusually rough around the edges for a late-2000s vintage Brooklyn band, or that they didn’t have the songwriting chops (they had been hailed early on by Pitchfork and others for songs like “Rain On”).  But they were nothing like the polished, free-jamming foursome that I saw this Thursday at Abrons Arts Center.  Backed by the Joshua Light Show, who projected molting swirls and swatches of color behind them, Woods played now-common favorites like “Rain On” and “Blood Dries Darker,” but they also demonstrated their status as the preeminent indie rock jam band.  That term, of course, is pejorative in the circles this band belongs in, but it seems fitting for a set that included an 8-minute “The Hold” and another song that stretched an impressive 16 minutes!   Joshua Light Show concerts are legendary and rare, and in honor of that, Woods came out and slayed it, giving one of the best performances I have seen this year.   With the swirling colors behind them, the band members’ interplay seemed almost magical, mesmerizing the crowd as the colors matched their rhythms.   These light shows are particularly special in that they are performed live with liquids and other mysterious ingredients, so no two shows are alike.  Do yourself a favor, and put any future Joshua Light Show concerts high on your list.  To see what The New York Times had to say, click here.

I recorded this set from dead center on the balcony with the DPA microphones.  The sound is superb.  As an added bonus, I have included a link to an earlier Woods show that I recorded on August 14, 2009 at the Bell House, when they opened for Dungen.  The evolution in even this short amount of time is, I think, revealing.

Download the complete shows on the Live Music Archive: [ABRONS ARTS CENTER] | [BELL HOUSE]

ABRONS ARTS CENTER SHOW:

BELL HOUSE SHOW:

Woods
2010-05-13
Abrons Arts Center
New York, NY  USA

An acidjack master recording
Recorded and produced by acidjack for nyctaper.com
Premiere download exclusively at nyctaper.com

Equipment: DPA 4021>Edirol R-44 (Oade Concert Mod)
Position: Balcony, DFC, ORTF
Mastering: 24bit/44.1kHz WAV>Audacity (set fades, tracking, amplify channels, EQ (trim 100-400Hz, boost 10-20kHz))>FLAC ( level 8 )

Tracks
01 Intro
02 Creeps
03 Blood Dries Darker
04 To Clean>Get Back
05 Bend Beyond
06 Rain On
07 Suffering Season
08 Down This Road>The Hold
09 The Hold (continued)
10 I Was Gone
11 [Goodbye banter]

BONUS RECORDING

Woods
2009-08-14
The Bell House
Brooklyn, NY  USA

An acidjack master recording

Equipment: AKG ck91 cardiod capsules (Busman active mod)>custom battery box>R-09HR (24bit/48kHz)
Location: Mics mounted DIN on custom kwon bar on pole clamped to left corner of SBD cage, 10ft total height
Processing: WAV>Audacity (smooth peaks, tracking, downsample to 16bit/44.1kHz, amplify each channel to -0.1dB)>FLAC ( level 8 )

Tracks:
1. Intro
2. The Creeps
3. Blood Dries Darker
4. [banter]
5. Rain On
6. [segue/soundcheck]
7. Get Back
8. To Clean
9. The Number
10. Down This Road
11. The Hold
12. The Hold Cont.
13. Twisted Tongue

If you email nyctaper for access to these recordings, we expect that you will PLEASE SUPPORT Woods, visit their MySpace page, and purchase their official releases, including their latest, At Echo Lake, from Woodsist Records.

[Photos courtesy of Anthony Cuellar at TLC Blog]

Someone forgot to tell The Joy Formidable (that’s for-MID-able for those of us in the U.S.) that they aren’t playing in stadiums just yet.  We have raved about them repeatedly on NYCTaper, and if you read this site, the facts are well-known to you.  By which, I mean that the band delivers a set that is beautifully cacophonous, filling every inch of whatever space they are in, making their music larger than they are.  They bring a pop sensibility to a dense, wall-of-sound style that sounds like My Bloody Valentine had a baby with Annie Lennox (or something like that).  As bands these days go, TJF give off that ‘pre-rockstar’ vibe a bit more than most; the sense that while not many are seeing them now, many more will, soon enough.  This Welsh band (now by way of London) arrived in the U.S. back in January as an unknown quantity.  In the space of four months, they have played the hell out of NYC and elsewhere, with the crowds becoming larger and larger as they’ve continued.  This Mercury Lounge show was an unplanned coda to their latest U.S. jaunt, and a resplendent one.  Industry honchos and increasingly fervent fans packed Mercury despite the early set time (9pm), and the band delivered what we have now come to expect, a short, tight, dramatic set that covered most of the landscape of their newly released EP, A Balloon Called Moaning as well as some additional songs, including the new (to me, at least) “Anemone”.  This show ended, and enough had been said: They have proven what they came here to prove.

But if you read this site, you don’t need convincing.  This is a document of the last time anyone will see this band in a venue as small as Mercury Lounge for quite awhile (or so I predict).  As with our other recordings, I recorded this set with a combination of the soundboard feed and mics.  A word of listener advice – if you are playing this back on a more modest system (say, a car stereo or inexpensive earbuds), you will likely want to turn the bass down a bit for maximum enjoyment.  Our rig captured the wall of sound perfectly, but the house mix was not timid in any way.  Enjoy!

Direct download of MP3 files [HERE]

Download the Complete show in FLAC [HERE].

The Joy Formidable
2010-05-10
Mercury Lounge
New York, NY  USA

An acidjack master recording
Recorded and produced by acidjack for nyctaper.com

Equipment: Soundboard+DPA 4021>Edirol R-44 (Oade Concert Mod)
Position: Clamp to right of soundboard cage, about 9.5? up
Mastering: 2×24bit/44.1kHz WAV files>Audacity (mixdown, set fades, EQ, tracking, amplify channels, downsample to 16bit)>FLAC ( level 8 )

Tracks: [Total Time: 44:00:00]
01 The Greatest Light Is the Greatest Shade
02 Cradle
03 The Last Drop
04 Austere
05 Ostrich
06 Greyhounds In The Slips
07 banter
08 Anemone
09 intro/banter
10 Whirring

If you email nyctaper for access to this recording, we expect that you will PLEASE SUPPORT The Joy Formidable, visit their website, and purchase their debut EP A Balloon Called Moaning from the Black Bell Records website [here] or from the store at the TJF website [here].

[photo by nyctaper]

The last time I saw Gary Louris perform on stage, it was an off-night of a long Jayhawks tour for the criminal under-appreciated Sound of Lies (circa ’97-’98) at a semi-secret show at Mercury Lounge. At close range, one of the 90’s most influential alt-country bands (even after the exit of Mark Olson) were a pleasure to behold and that Mercury gig is a great memory. Although several members still occasionally play together, the slow demise of the Jayhawks was one of the more sad turns of the early 00’s. So it was with great joy that we read of the new plans for a 2010 reunion in Minneapolis, with plans to play some East coast shows including NYC later in the year. At the Truck America Festival last weekend, Gary Louris played a set of his solo and Jayhawks material, and provided an excellent preview of this much anticipated reunion. Gary’s unique baritone has not worn with age, and his guitar work is as melodic as ever. To close the set, Gary was joined by the “barn band”, which included the Bennett brothers, Tim Easton and Cat Martino. The group performed three numbers, including “best of” Jayhawks classics “I’d Run Away” and “Blue”, and if fan pages are to be believed, the finale brought tears to the eyes of Jayhawks devotees.

Gary Louris plays NYC this coming Friday May 14 at Le Poisson Rouge, tickets are still available here.

We recorded this set with the same equipment and location as the Mercury Rev set and the sound quality is excellent. Enjoy!

Direct download of MP3 files (HERE)

Download the Complete show in FLAC [HERE].

Gary Louris
2010-05-01
Truck America Festival
Big Indian, NY USA

Digital Master Recording
Soundboard + Audience Matrix

Soundboard + Neumann KM-150s > Edirol R-44 (Oade Concert Mod) > 2x 24bit 48kHz wav files > Soundforge (level adjustments, mixdown, set fades) > CDWave 1.95 (tracking) > Flac Frontend (level 7, align sector boundaries) > flac

Recorded and Produced by nyctaper
2010-05-09

Setlist:
[Total Time 56:43]
01 [introduction]
02 Angelyne
03 D.C. Blues
04 Tailspin
05 Everybody Knows
06 Listen Joe
07 Settled Down Like Rain
08 I Need You Tonight [new song]
09 Poor Little Fish
10 Save It For A Rainy Day
11 She Only Calls Me On Sundays
12 Waiting For The Sun
13 All the Right Reasons
14 I’m Gonna Make You Love Me
15 I’d Run Away
16 Blue

If you email nyctaper for access to this recording, we expect that you will PLEASE SUPPORT Gary Louris, visit his facebook page (most updated info), visit his website, and purchase his official releases from the Store at his website [here].

[She Keeps Bees at the Green Man Festival, August 2009.  Photo courtesy of Rachel Lipsitz at littletrousers.com]

She Keeps Bees vocalist Jessica Larrabee can claim an impressive line of predecessors and contemporaries, the most obvious of the former being Janis Joplin, and the closest of the latter being Heartless Bastards‘ Erika Wennerstrom.  That Larrabee elicits such comparisons is not an accusation of plagiarism, but a testament to the power of her delivery.  Together with drummer Andy LaPlant, She Keeps Bees play unpretentious, raw blues rock without apology or extra bullshit.  The band’s spare production – evident on their records, particularly the excellent Nests, as well as in their stripped-down live show – provides the perfect vehicle for that voice, cracking with heartbreak in one song, exhorting a lover in another, wailing in exultation the next.  This band isn’t out to win awards for changing the game, but they are playing it at a hell of a high level.

Although they hail from Brooklyn, I first discovered She Keeps Bees through a British taper friend who had caught them opening for another band in the UK.  Perhaps it was fitting then, that my live introduction to them came as they opened for nyctaper favorites The Joy Formidable (whose set will be posted soon) at the Mercury Lounge.  Catch their free show this Wednesday, May 12, with the excellent band Papa at Brooklyn Bowl and see for yourself.

I recorded this set from the usual spot in the venue with the DPA microphones combined with a stereo soundboard feed.  The combination produced a recording of exceptional clarity and high quality.  Hear it for yourself on the posted sample, “Ribbon.”  Enjoy!

Direct download of MP3 files (HERE).  Listen to “Ribbon” (HERE).

Download the Complete show in FLAC [HERE].

She Keeps Bees
2010-05-10
Mercury Lounge
New York, NY  USA

An acidjack master recording
Recorded and produced by acidjack for nyctaper.com

Equipment: Soundboard+DPA 4021>Edirol R-44 (Oade Concert Mod) (24/44.1)
Position: Clamp to right side of SBD cage, 8ft total height)
Mastering: 2×24bit WAV>Audacity (mixdown, set fades, downsample, tracking)>FLAC Level 8

01 Pile Up
02 Release
03 banter
04 Gimme
05 “I Don’t Believe You”
06 Wear Red
07 Get Gone
08 [unknown]
09 Ribbon
10 Cold Eye

If you email nyctaper for access to this recording, we expect that you will PLEASE SUPPORT She Keeps Bees, visit their website, and purchase their excellent records from your favorite retailer.  Amazon link here.

[amazing photos taken for nyctaper by David Andrako]

Local Natives are on the speed-of-light upwards artistic trajectory. As a group of friends from Orange County California, the band was two short years ago barely out of school, known by another name, and self-recording in a house they shared. Two months ago, their debut album Gorilla Manor was released stateside by Frenchkiss Records, and the band is currently on a whirlwind tour of sold out venues, popular success, and critical raves. On Thursday and again on Friday, Local Natives sold out Bowery Ballroom. We saw the band on Friday, where in the middle of their set they performed the Talking Heads cover that appears on their album (“Warning Sign”) while David Byrne himself peered down approvingly from the Bowery balcony. In what must have been an heady and surreal moment for a band of early 20’s Cali-kids, Local Natives seem to have taken it all in stride. With only one album under their belt, the band’s set was a tad short on length, but it was certainly long on hooky west coast indie folk-rock harmony, and the screaming crowd offered their unceasing and unqualified approval.

Local Natives return to NYC for a Saturday August 7 show on Governor’s Island.

We recorded this set from the balcony rail with the four microphone rig and the sound quality is excellent. Enjoy!

Direct download of MP3 files (HERE)

Download the Complete show in FLAC [HERE].

Local Natives
2010-05-07
Bowery Ballroom
New York, NY USA

Four-Track Digital Master
Recorded from Balcony Rail

Neumann KM-150s + DPA 4021’s > Edirol R-44 (Oade Concert Mod) > 2x 24bit 48kHz wav files > Soundforge (level adjustments, mixdown, set fades) > CDWave 1.95 (tracking) > Flac Frontend (level 7, align sector boundaries) > flac

Recorded and Produced by nyctaper
2010-05-07

Setlist:
[Total Time 56:29]
01 Camera Talk
02 World News
03 Wide Eyes
04 Cards & Quarters
05 Shape Shifter
06 Warning Sign (Talking Heads)
07 Cubism Dream
08 Airplanes
09 Who Knows Who Cares
10 [encore break]
11 Stranger Things
12 Sun Hands

If you email nyctaper for access to this recording, we expect that you will PLEASE SUPPORT Local Natives, visit their website, visit their MySpace page, and purchase Gorilla Manor directly from Frenchkiss Records [here].

[photo by nyctaper]

Its hard to distinguish between the multitude of “garage” bands these days, as the genre has reached its critical mass. The proliferation of three and four-piece guitar-bass-drums lo-fi two-minute-song band can be dizzying, especially when it seems that a new one is championed every day by Pitchfork. What separates Harlem from the rest, and what likely resulted in their signing to Matador, is the obvious songwriting ability and vocal talents. Harlem can be screamers, but the band can also harmonize — making them less Nuggets-style garage and more British Invasion-esque (“Someday Soon” sounds like a Beatles Vee-Jay Records outtake). Although some of their contemporaries can be somewhat hard on the ears, Harlem’s new album Hippies (released in April, 2010) is a delectable collection of fine pop songs dressed up in youthful recklessness. That style was on display as Harlem opened for Titus Andronicus a couple of weeks ago at Maxwell’s. As the band worked from an improvised setlist, the show picked randomly among songs from their two albums, but the energy was positive and the interplay with the crowd was good-natured and humorous. The band dedicated their final song “Beautiful & Very Smart” to a couple in the crowd who had just gotten married that day.

We recorded this set as a four-track soundboard/audience matrix from out usual location in this venue and the sound is excellent. Enjoy!

Direct download of MP3 files (HERE)

Download the Complete show in FLAC [HERE].

Harlem
2010-04-24
Maxwell’s
Hoboken, NJ USA

Digital Master Recording
Soundboard + Audience Matrix

Soundboard + Neumann KM-150s > Edirol R-44 (Oade Concert Mod) > 2x 24bit 48kHz wav files > Soundforge (level adjustments, mixdown, set fades) > CDWave 1.95 (tracking) > Flac Frontend (level 7, align sector boundaries) > flac

Recorded and Produced by nyctaper
2010-05-07

Setlist:
[Total Time 30:50]
01 Witchgreens
02 Someday Soon
03 Gay Human Bones
04 South of France
05 Be Your Baby
06 Friendly Ghost
07 Number One
08 Caroline
09 Scare You
10 [banter]
11 Beautiful & Very Smart

If you email nyctaper for access to this recording, we expect that you will PLEASE SUPPORT Harlem, visit their MySpace page, and purchase Hippies directly from Matador Records [here].

[photo by nyctaper]

Twenty years ago, Jonathan Donohue was a member of both The Flaming Lips and Mercury Rev. Although his tenure with the Lips lasted just two albums, echoes of the humanistic psychedelic indie folk-rock that both bands helped create still reside in Donohue’s songs. And while both bands reached their critical and artistic peaks in the late 90’s, the Lips with The Soft Bulletin and Mercury Rev with Deserter’s Songs, in recent years their parallel paths have diverged. The Flaming Lips of recent vintage concentrate more on the theatrical and marginally bombastic elements of their music, and seem to be content to deliver the same prop-heavy performances year after year. Donohue has maintained a lower profile and has delivered a series of excellent albums, the most recent of which, Snowflake Midnight, contains what is arguably his most heartfelt lyrical work. On Saturday night at the Truck America Festival, Mercury Rev headlined the main stage with a new wrinkle — a string section conducted by Joe Bennett. Additionally, Mercury Rev alums Justin and Jason Russo joined the band for this special show.  From the outset it was abundantly clear that this was no ordinary set, but rather was more a career-celebrating retrospective.  Jonathan acknowledged his long time fans, referenced the twenty year old self-released cassettes that he brought along to the festival, and delivered a set that included a song from those old cassettes (“Car Wash Hair”), a moving Nico cover (the Jackson Browne penned “These Days”), and indeed one of his Flaming Lips contributions (“There You Are: Jesus Song No. 7”). The string section did not just work well, it was almost as if each song demanded the contributions of these outstanding musicians and the seamless scoring of Joe Bennett. Of particular note, the guitar and clarinet work of Sean “Grasshopper” Mackowiak was sublime and superb. At the close of the set, “Isn’t It A Pity” was such a strong emotional number that although the stage was set to close for the night, Mercury Rev was called back for an encore. It was the only encore we saw all weekend.

I recorded this set in the same location and with the same rig as The Joy Formidable set from the previous night. However, the mix for this set was quite excellent, and as a result the sound quality of this recording is outstanding. Enjoy!

Direct download of MP3 files (HERE)

Download the Complete show in FLAC [HERE].

Mercury Rev
2010-05-01
Truck America Festival
Big Indian, NY USA

Digital Master Recording
Soundboard + Audience Matrix

Soundboard + Neumann KM-150s > Edirol R-44 (Oade Concert Mod) > 2x 24bit 48kHz wav files > Soundforge (level adjustments, mixdown, set fades) > CDWave 1.95 (tracking) > Flac Frontend (level 7, align sector boundaries) > flac

Recorded and Produced by nyctaper
2010-05-05

Setlist:
[Total Time 1:02:35]
01 Endlessly
02 [banter]
03 First-Time Mother’s Joy (Flying)
04 Car Wash Hair
05 Blue Clouds (Daniel Johnston)
06 Tonight It Shows
07 Runaway Raindrop
08 [banter]
09 Opus 40
10 There You Are: Jesus Song No. 7
11 Holes
12 These Days (Jackson Browne)
13 Isn’t It A Pity
14 [encore break]
15 Goddess On A Hiway

If you email nyctaper for access to this recording, we expect that you will PLEASE SUPPORT Mercury Rev, visit their website, and purchase their official releases from the store at the Mercury Rev website [here].

[photo by nyctaper]

The real test of the quality of a band is whether their music translates in different settings with varying audiences. When we saw The Joy Formidable in a packed Pianos in January, the energy in the room was palpable and their set was quite powerful. Our conclusion was that the band was absolutely destined for greater success. In the intervening couple of months, our prescience has proved correct — The Joy Formidable returned to NYC on Saturday to play before a sold-out and over capacity Mercury Lounge. But the set that again proved the abundant worth of this Welsh trio was their performance headlining the main stage on Friday night at the Truck America Festival. In the spacious outdoors and cool night Catskills air, TJF powered the entire main stage tent with their abundant energy. From the opening notes of “Greatest Light”, Ritzy and Rhydian attacked their instruments and pranced around the stage while Matt mashed the drums relentlessly. At one point, Ritzy got a bit carried away and nearly smashed into the entire drum kit. Order restored, the band whipped through their standard setlist (we had hoped for “Popinjay”, which they saved for Mercury), and closed the set and the main stage day with eight minutes of relentless “Whirring”, as the kneeling Ritzy ravaged her pedals and amp.

This set was recorded with the R-44 four track, with two Neumann microphones on a stand at the soundboard mixed with a stereo board feed. The sound quality is quite good, and subject to only the limitations of recording music in a tent. Enjoy!

The Joy Formidable have added a special show at the end of the current tour in which they return to Mercury Lounge on May 10.

Today (May 4), The Joy Formidable release their new EP A Balloon Called Moaning on Black Bell Records.

Direct download of MP3 files (HERE)

Download the Complete show in FLAC [HERE].

The Joy Formidable
2010-04-30
Truck America Festival
Big Indian, NY USA

Digital Master Recording
Soundboard + Audience Matrix

Soundboard + Neumann KM-150s > Edirol R-44 (Oade Concert Mod) > 2x 24bit 48kHz wav files > Soundforge (level adjustments, mixdown, set fades) > CDWave 1.95 (tracking) > Flac Frontend (level 7, align sector boundaries) > flac

Recorded and Produced by nyctaper
2010-05-03

Setlist:
[Total Time 41:02]
01 The Greatest Light Is the Greatest Shade
02 Cradle
03 The Last Drop
04 Austere
05 Ostrich
06 Magnifying Glass
07 Anemone
08 Whirring

If you email nyctaper for access to this recording, we expect that you will PLEASE SUPPORT The Joy Formidable, visit their website, and purchase their debut EP A Balloon Called Moaning from the Black Bell Records website [here] or from the store at the TJF website [here].