A live show, some words

Last Tuesday I played what is, I guess, the first Natural Light show. Or live action. It's the name I have been using for a whole bunch of stuff. Mainly this blog, art stuff, and some music I've made / played during the last 9 month or so. After last Tuesday, I have derived the following statistic:

Number of good first shows: zero.

I played two cover songs. The first was WHY?'s "The Fall of Mr. Fifths" done as a capella rap sort of thing. Second was a cover of Casiotone for the Painfully Alone's "Killers".

Mr. Fifths went fine. Killers did not.

The biggest difference is probably my own outlook on what I wanted to achieve vs. what I did. Both songs were things I wanted to do, and with the first I did what I wanted to do. I don't really care whether or not anyone watching/listening liked what they were hearing. It's not about that. It is about feeling like I was accomplishing what I set out to do: performing my arrangements of music that means a tremendous amount to me.

I really do get that there might be a disconnect playing such a heavy song when the show started with a Rebecca Black parody. But it's what I wanted to do. Whoever laughed, as if "I know your mom was your age when she had your brother" was a punchline, you are not my intended audience. For this performance, or for anything I will ever create or do in my life. You are not what bothers me. That I played so poorly does.

A lot of it comes down to rehearsing in conditions that were a lot different from the performance itself. Not even now being in front of lights and crowd that probably doesn't care about your music specifically. Things like standing at a keyboard instead of sitting at a piano, basically turning into a totally different instrument under my fingers. Having a drum machine on my right instead of on the left. Things I should have foreseen, thought about, and planned for and didn't.

There were problems with my ability to play a keyboard, sequence, and sing at the same time. And there were technical problems, like something with the drums sounding pretty shitty running through the amp I had to use last minute. And problems with the event itself, where coordinator was insanely rude and asked me, act 18 of 21, to only play one song for the sake of time roughly 50 seconds before I went on.

I was kind of mortified and devastated immediately after, and thanks extensively to my girlfriend, and thanks a small, surprising bit to some guy who came up to me in the parking lot afterward, felt a little better the next day.

Still, I think the experience is something important to come to terms with and talk about while it's still vaguely permeating my thoughts. I won't really get a chance to talk about a first show ever again, anyway.

I don't know when I'll ever do this again (or have the chance to), but I'm not writing it off as completely as I was when I walked off the stage. I have been writing a lot of new stuff (terribly, terribly fragmented new stuff). A semi relevant one:

to never fall into that trap
of a disappointing live act
songs becoming old and played lived less
wearing out not unlike i did sometime after the 12th grade
the run-on of ritualistic mass transit
the reason for this, the reason to consider language in...finite
and it felt infinite

as for what i did to deserve this
went to college, got nervous

I still think about this all a lot.

Yoni & Josiah Wolf (as WHY?) 04.17.11 Philadelphia, PA @ First Unitarian Church

This was the last of three Yoni Wolf solo shows three shows taking place in Philadelphia's First Unitarian Church this weekend, all three with opening support from Frances Quinlan of Hop Along. The space is small, not more than ten rows of pews, each seating three comfortably. The bands set up maybe four feet away from the first row. The extraordinarily intimate setting matched the purpose of the event perfectly And favorably eliminated both a crowd and the need for anyone to stand.

More with aesthetics: It was odd, seeing Yoni at his most put together. His hair showing no signs of the unruly curls that have pervaded WHY? promotional images since the cLOUDDEAD days; instead it is slicked respectably with product. His fairly characteristic mustache sits natural on has face, looking absolutely unnovel. It's the look of a man who might have things together: the same one who posted a picture to facebook of himself signing on first house a week ago..

But his words betrayed him, in the way they've made WHY?'s career doing. Dense, intricate internal rhymes characteristic of earlier WHY? material were matched by some powerful (and powerfully sad, chill-inducing) refrains. On the only item being sold at the merch table--a limited edition screen print--was written the phrase "I know with no uncertainty that I'm uncertain and I don't know." The line was the foundation for a chorus of a song in the middle of the set. Brutally effective, I felt myself wanting to sing along without knowing the words to sing. This question of "ok, but where next?" ran throughout the set, informing nearly all eight of the new songs.

With only two players, arrangements were unexpectedly sparse. Yoni mostly perched at a church piano that had fallen slightly out of tune, Josiah alternating between guitar and bass while operating a bass drum simultaneously. The songs were played with lots of thumping low end, drums keeping time layered with funk-inspired bass lines. Maybe rap-like, maybe not.

As mentioned above, the set (below, with some annotations, including fragments of lyrics so proper titles can be attached once these things have proper titles) was almost entirely comprised of new WHY? material composed between 2007 and now, to be recorded for the next WHY? record in May and June 2011. Stressed online, and again a song or two into the set, a strict rule against any recording was in place. And understandably so, but it's a bit of a bummer that no one will be able to hear these songs again for a few months. Or maybe more than a few, depending.

The hype is hard to handle, especially with the final product farther away than any of us would like. Doing this sort of trial tour so early is the makings for a tough, frustrating wait. In context, it's the highest compliment I can give the band as they and Snake return to the studio with completely new material for the first time in years.

Good luck, godspeed, etc etc. We're waiting to be blown away.

Further considerations: Someone managed to get hold of a setlist for one of these shows, so I am editing in what the setlist calls these songs. The set seems to be exactly the same, with phrases I remember matching up with the current "official" titles.


FRANCES QUINLAN

01. Freshman Year

02. Sally

03. Tibetan Popstars

YONI & JOSIAH WOLF

01. New - Paper

Features lyrics shown on a video Yoni posted on his facebook a few weeks ago when he was recording the album 5 demos.

02. New - Always

"like that"

03. The Vowels Pt. 2

From Alopecia (2008)

04. Half a Person

Smiths cover. Same arrangement as on this RadioK session.

05. New (My Most Intimate Geometry) - 27

I actually have this one on a bootleg from early 2009, performed a capella. It sounded really great with piano at the show. The title above is what I named it on the bootleg when I cut up the soundboard two years ago.

06. Brook & Waxing

From Alopecia (2008)

07. New - Distance

"keep distance"

08. New - Kevin

"I know with no uncertainty that I'm uncertain and I don't know."

09. New - Bitter

"liar pretends to confess"

10. New - Straw

"no, I am not ok, boys"

11. New - Mumps

"as ill as I am"

12-13. Pick Fights / Deceived

From the Rubber Traits CD-single / Dumb Hummer 7''. A really cool surprise. I've never seen either of these Rubber Traits/Dumb Hummer b-sides turn up on any bootleg or "almost live" album.

Encore:

14. Close to Me

Cure cover. Posted to the WHY? Myspace in 2008, but to be released on the forthcomng OIBrecords Split Series Vol. 5 this year.

15. These Few Presidents

From Alopecia (2008)

16. One Rose

From Eskimo Snow (2009)