WOO ALLRIGHT YEAH UH HUH

Coming from Gainesville, Sarasota’s nightlife has been pretty painful – so I decided to try to get something started.  With help from Sweaterpuppet, we’ve got Sarasota’s first indie dance night organized!  It’s gonna be at Rico’s (between New College and Ringling) Thursday nights from 10-2am.

This is the first time Rico’s has had a thing like this, and we’re doing everything we can to make it jammin.  It’s free to get in, and they just installed a full bar.  So come!

Washes away clean, no soapy residue!

[ 11PM-1AM 96.5FM WSLR / live stream / podcast: iTunes or other ]

We recorded the wrong input during the show and ended up with a 2 hour tape of us talking.

“But, but…dangerousawesome, we love hearing you talk!”

I knoooow. I know! Believe me, I know. But we just can’t. Too much off-air hate speech.

Tune in next week!

Last Exit rarely left my playlist after that introduciton. Its merging of IDM-influenced electro production with an unabashedly emotive lead singer wasn’t totally fresh in concept – The Postal Service had already released their breakthrough LP. Yet Last Exit had a markedly different soul – a pronounced R&B influence, and a more grounded, at times jaded, lead. Vocalist/writer Greenspan’s performance somehow believably conveyed a dejected loneliness and a frustrated sexuality at the same time. But it was the odd rhythms of Last Exit that really drew me in. The drums were meticulously programmed and very dense, yet never overwhelming. The best songs gave maximum space for syncopated skitter-skatter hi-hats to flutter between the sparse, but also rhythmically interesting synth lines. Much of this was probably due to former member Johnny Dark, who had production credits on all of my favorites.

I haven’t listened to So This is Goodbye, the Boys 2006 release, nearly as much. It’s a more streamlined album, with relatively simplistic rhythms and melodies and a more confident, empowered Greenspan. It’s still an excellent record, but its popish aims stripped away much of what gave the first album staying power with me.

Onstage, Junior Boys put on a respectable show. Producer Didemus stayed behind a row of hardware and a laptop, but didn’t do much besides trigger the next arpeggio or pad loop. I think he may have played one or two synth lines live. Greenspan was much more active, alternating between playing guitar and bass while singing in a range only slightly narrower than on the albums. But while his voice was surprisingly clear live, the sexual pantings deployed on some of their newer songs seemed all the more contrived onstage. He just couldn’t quite pull them off. That being said, the sound was great, and they played almost every song I would expect them to, with the glaring, disappointing exception of “High Come Down.” They almost made up for that transgression with a rousing performance of “Under The Sun,” probably the most boring album track off of Last Exit. It was as if they wanted to let the fans know how the song was supposed to sound, and it was good.

These last two shows have been a crash course in photography. For this show, I was experimenting with “taking pictures of the back of dudes’ heads” and “fooling with settings I don’t understand.” Enjoy!

Beer! Babes! FREEEEE money!

And a special announcement!

As always we’ll be broadcasting locally on 96.5FM and webcasting here. If you miss the show you can go directly to the podcast here, or here for iTunes.

The group consist of producer Ethin and vocalist Alice. They play electro that draws as much from Electroclash as vintage game music (think 8-bit) and Punk. Their songs are straight to the point, and often, like many of the more progressive indie acts today, careen off on unexpected tangents. Lyrically, it’s hard to make much sense of them. But Alice is certainly angry about something.

Onstage, producer Ethin stayed hunched over a single synth (microKorg for those curious), banging out melodies and peeking out of his hoodie for a few vocoded choruses. Alice demanded the crowds attention, bouncing and marching about while yelling over the quick drums and crunchy synths of their EP. She’s young, and her slightly-awkward determination gave the whole show an air of freshness and credibility. They were joined by a live drummer, placing their performance in a more accessible Rock context than their released tracks. It worked to their advantage, and I wouldn’t be surprised if their next release features “real” drums.

Most notably about Crystal Castles’ performance was that, unlike so much contemporary synth-pop, they eschewed any displays of irony. They projected a youthful, pure, and sincere energy that was doubly exciting when set against our wink-wink nudge-nudge culture.

The stage was lit only by a single strobe, which REALLY worked for the performance, but not so well for taking pictures.

more (horrible) pictures here.

Crystal Castles and The Presets are gonna be at Crowbar this Monday, and it’s gonna be rad.

S-Peezy, as he demands to be called, is also throwing a serious blow-your-face-off neon and sunglasses party at New College Palm Court this Saturday. It’s going to be bonkers. There will definitely be some fresh indie, electro, and hip-hop jams to dance to. There will not be green beer or Irish Punk. There are some wild rumors of a stunna shade throwdown that I just can’t confirm at this time.