[photo by Jono Bernstein]
Add Wand to the list of bands best realized as a live act. Not to disrespect their two most recent albums, this year’s Golem and last year’s Ganglion Reef, both fine efforts in the lazily-named “garage-psych” canon that add the band’s wizards-and-warlocks imagery to the mix of guitar pyrotechnics and punk urgency that characterize, to some degree, the efforts of regular tourmate Ty Segall and others. Heard in the vacuum of headphones or home speakers, alone, it’s too easy to lump them in with the other bands whose names you know and move on.
But live, there are clearer nods to the band’s actual influences: Rainbow, T. Rex, Bowie, early period Zeppelin — some of the bands that influenced the much-derided L.A. “glam” scene of the 1980s. Wand owe a very much larger debt to these bands than their contemporaries, and that’s not a bad thing. In fact, the glammy sensibility Wand brings to the table serves as a reminder that the wholesale death of the L.A. scene at the hands of grunge was a bit of a throwing out of the baby with the bathwater. If those seventies touchstones can be blamed for giving us Poison and Warrant, it’s worth remembering that the better attitudes they embodied were being unafraid to have style or show off how well you can play, and to make each performance a true performance. Wand may not wear makeup or tight clothing, but their show brings with it some of that theatrical feel that makes them stand out. That’s what made them darlings at South By Southwest, where one of us captured their burner of a set at the Panache Booking-sponsored Hotel Vegas show and deemed it the best thing he saw all festival.
We’ll let you judge for yourself, with a three-fer of Wand shows in a range of situations. There’s that SXSW show and a September 2014 show opening for Ty Segall at Webster Hall, together with the most recent appearance by the band in NYC, an hourlong headlining gig at Mercury Lounge. I caught the Mercury show, and was taken straight away by the band’s command of the stage. Songs from their two albums enjoyed a range of reinterpretations and rocked-out treatments, while frontman Cory Thomas Hanson gave us the kind of vocal performance we’re just not used to hearing anymore. I appreciated that amidst the pounding — and the band also comes across much heavier and less spacey live than on record — the band slowed things down from time to time, such as when they lead us into the cosmic swirl of “Melted Rope.” Each of these three shows ends on the same number, the band’s most reliable “jam” song “Generator Larping”, which is as sure a recipe for a great end to the night as anything I’ve heard this year.
These sets are all combinations of soundboard feeds with high-quality audience microphones, and each of them is of excellent quality. Enjoy!
Downloads: Mercury Lounge [MP3] | [FLAC] || SXSW [MP3] | [FLAC] || Webster Hall [MP3] | [FLAC]
Stream the complete Mercury Lounge show:
Stream “Generator Larping” from SXSW:
Wand
2015-03-29
Mercury Lounge
New York, NY USA
Exclusive download hosted at nyctaper.com
Recorded and produced by acidjack
Schoeps MK41 (PAS)>KCY>Z-PFA>Aerco MP-2 + Soundboard (engineer: Dave Lefcourt)>>Edirol R-44 [OCM]>2x24bit/48kHz WAV>Adobe Audition CS 5.5 (mix down, fades, limiter)>Izotope Ozone 5 (EQ, effects, imaging)>Audacity 2.0.5 (track, amplify, balance, downsample)>FLAC ( level 8 )
Tracks [Total Time: 58:00]
01 The Unexplored Map
02 Self Hypnosis In 3 Days
03 [unknown1]
04 Floating Head
05 Melted Rope
06 Fire On the Mountain I-II-III
07 Flying Golem
08 Reaper Invert
09 Planet Golem
10 Generator Larping
_______________________________________
Wand
2015-03-20
Hotel Vegas – Panache SXSW
Austin, TX USA
Digital Master Recording
Soundboard + Audience Matrix
Soundboard + Sennheiser MKH-8040 Cardioids > Sound Devices 744t > 2 x 24bit 48kHz wav files > Soundforge (post production) > CDWave 1.95 (tracking) > TLH > flac (320 MP3 and tagging via Foobar)
Recorded and Produced
by nyctaper
Setlist:
[Total Time 40:07]
01 The Unexplored Map
02 Self Hypnosis in 3 Days
03 Floating Head
04 Fire On The Mountain
05 Flying Golem
06 Planet Golem
07 Generator Larping
_______________________________________
Wand
2014-09-17
Webster Hall
New York NY
Digital Master Recording
Soundboard + Audience Matrix
Soundboard [engineer: Rafael] + Schoeps CCM4u Cardioids > Edirol R-44 (Oade Concert Mod) > 2 x 24bit 48kHz wav files > Soundforge (level adjustments, mixdown, EQ, set fades) > CDWave 1.95 (tracking) > TLH > flac (320 MP3 and tagging via Foobar)
Recorded and Produced by nyctaper
Setlist:
[Total Time 37:41]
01 Send Receive (Mind)
02 [new song]
03 Fire On The Mountain
04 Broken Candle
05 Flying Golem
06 [new song 2]
07 [banter – last night]
08 Generator Larping
If you enjoyed this recording, PLEASE SUPPORT Wand, visit their website, and buy Golem here and Ganglion Reef from Drag City here.
[photo by acidjack]
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