live: M83, School of Seven Bells @ Bottom Lounge
When I interviewed School of Seven Bells, at some point I described their music as having an “esoteric” quality. Esoteric was a word I wanted to avoid saying, for fear that it would make it seem as if I thought they were relying on some lame “New-Age” gimmick, instead of being serious artists trying to do something original. They didn’t at all quibble about the word, and the interview ended without complaint. Later, when School of Seven Bells took the stage about half an hour after their scheduled start time and began to play, it became clear that in no way was their music “intended to be understood by a small number of people,” at least live that is.
Alejandra, who does guitar and vocals, apologized for having had problems with her throat the year before, and promised to make up for it. The guy standing next to me told me that he’d seen School of Seven Bells open for Prefuse 73 the year before, and hadn’t particularly liked them; he thought they were too quiet. Apparently the band thought so too, because their performance at Bottom Lounge was anything but. One of the most compelling things about the performance was the size of their music, and the way it took up the space in the room like some material thing. Sure, the cool vocal tricks on songs like “Prince of Peace” and “Iamundernodisguise” got kind of washed out amid the volume of everything else, but it’s a price worth paying for turning up the volume; and sure, the people in the back were talking throughout, and the band looked a little irritated at points, but I’m starting to think that people who stand in the back only come to shows so that they can talk through the opening act.
Now, I’m embarrassed to admit that I didn’t know much about M83 when I saw them perform. Anyone whose been to a concert knows full well that familiarity with the material increases greatly the amount of fun you’ll have. Keeping that in mind, it’s really incredible that I enjoyed their set to the extent that I did. It probably had a great deal to do with the “delivery” of the music, so to speak. The entire band’s very serious posture; the silent, rapt audience; Anthony Gonzalez’s insanely cool glowing instrument, which appears to be an old school rack synthesizer or sequencer. Every good live act has to establish an atmosphere when they get onstage, and M83 certainly excelled at that.
Probably another good reason for their involving live show is the electro-shoegaze/80s adolescence dynamic they set up on their latest album, Saturdays = Youth. Whoever knew that songs like “Graveyard Girl” and “Kim & Jessie” were complementary to tracks like “We Own the Sky” and “Colours?” After a while I noticed that though a lot of M83’s songs where to some degree danceable, probably a majority of the audience was standing completely still, like they were watching a poetry reading or something. Then I realized that they probably didn’t want to move; they weren’t there for the spectacle that happened onstage, they were there for the spectacle that happens in the space between your ears, and maybe that’s enjoyed best standing still.
