Did you ever meet the kind of person who says “what's the point of going to see concerts? I have to deal with a crowd of people, pay for overpriced drinks, and often the sound sucks. Why not just stay home and listen to the albums?” What a jackass, right? Well...I used to be that person. To be fair, I had seen a couple concerts so I felt justified in my opinions. The error in my reasoning was that I hadn't been going to the right kind of concerts. I mean, if you're going to get people to come see you, the onus is on you to provide them with something beyond the album experience. You need to improvise/jam, to do medleys, to have a visual spectacle of a stage show, to mix-up setlists and play rare/older material, to rearrange songs and perform them in new ways...you get the idea. The possibilities seem limitless yet so many bands, even bands I love, stick to the standard, boring concert experience. Though I've sadly never seen them live, Phish and Animal Collective put great care into their live shows; arguably, Phish put more emphasis on their live shows than they do on their studio albums. I get the sense Oh Sees split the difference pretty damn well, if Live In San Francisco is anything to go by. While we did technically get a live album from Oh Sees well before Live In San Francisco, it almost doesn't count since, y'know, there wasn't an audience present. And anyway, this one is a more accurate representation of the live Oh Sees experience.
You know what time it is: let's run
down the vitals. Live In San Francisco was released on July
1st, 2016. It was taken from shows (July 15th-17th,
2015) during the tour following the release of Mutilator Defeated
At Last. By this point the trio lineup had expanded and mutated;
drummer Nick Murray left after the release of Mutilator, and
in came Dan Rincon and Ryan Moutinho. It's also worth noting, despite
the comments I brought up in the previous retrospective, John Dwyer
is definitely playing some kind of keyboard or synthesizer,
especially on 'Sticky Hulks.' It didn't occur to me until after I
finished that retrospective, by the by, that Dwyer's Damaged Bug
sideproject began around this time, so perhaps that was some kind of
influence on his words and actions? As far as I'm aware, Dwyer never
played any sort of keyboard/synth during live shows before Drop.
But I digress. You may be aware that the initial vinyl release of
Live In San Francisco (hereafter simply Live) came with
a DVD of the full album (which, sadly, I don't own, so I can't
comment on it) but you may not know that the limited edition
version also came with a 7” Flexi-disc of 'Ticklish Warrior.' It's
on YouTube, if you want to check it out, though the upload I found
has a bit of pop/hiss and it's not an especially revelatory
performance anyway. One last thing—does anybody know what the story
is with the bleeped out words right before 'I Come From The Mountain'
and at the end of 'Sticky Hulks'? My research only turned up
speculation that it was the name of the soundman during these
concerts, though if that's the case, I'm still confused why
they would need to bleep it. Maybe whoever it is told their
significant other they had to leave town for a wedding when they
actually snuck away to run the sound for these three nights instead?
Just a theory.
Like with the preceding studio album, Live is flawless. It ticks all the boxes of what you want from a live album. The recording quality is excellent and puts the two live tracks on Singles Collection Volume 3 to shame. Since this live release is culled from three nights of shows, you get the impression they picked the best performances and finessed it into something that has the flow and dynamics of a single live set. While diehard fans will always want more, Live is the perfect length, managing to cover a lot of ground in just under an hour. We get tracks from all the back to the Carrion Crawler/The Dream era, with 'Gelatinous Cube' previewing the then-forthcoming A Weird Exits. In addition, this buffet includes non-album deep cuts 'Man In A Suitcase' and 'Tidal Wave.' I can't help but pause here and mention the conspicuous absence of any songs from Putrifiers II or Drop—it's almost like they made this for me! Anyway, assuming you also have the DVD, the only thing this live album lacks is the smell of weed in the air and somebody spilling beer on you. I am confident, however, that if you, dear reader, want those things you could easily provide them yourself. One last thing I wanted to note is that it's quite odd how not many outlets reviewed this release. One outlet that did is a now-defunct website that Metacritic has a choice quote/blurb from saying Live has fifteen tracks, because I guess nobody but me bothers to pay attention to the details when it comes to Oh Sees. Oops, am I throwing shade again? I should save some, Summer is only a few months away.
I
almost forgot the most important thing about Live:
the lengthy workout of 'Contraption.' At almost 16 minutes it was the
longest track they had released up to this point. More important is
that it and a few other tracks hint at the jammier direction the band
would start to take in the studio, most obviously with Smote
Reverser onwards. An important
distinction to make is that this long 'Contraption' jam is closer to
the earlier style of Oh Sees stretching out, lacking any meaningful
solos or concentrated group interplay as we see nowadays live, or
even on Face Stabber.
So yeah, it's not so much a long jam with traditional solos like
Cream's first live album as it is Dwyer making all kinds of guitar
drones/groans/moans and psychedelic noise while the rhythm section
keeps the krautrock pulse going. I know I keep bringing them up and
maybe nobody else sees it but me, but Dwyer's instrumental
pyrotechnics are almost akin to a spacey/experimental Phish jam, very
abstract and rhythmically/melodically “out” or “outside” in
the jazz sense of being “out”/”outside.” I have to say, I
prefer the current drummer duo of Dan Rincon and Paul Quattrone,
though this is likely because they've had more time to play together.
Listening close on headphones, Ryan Moutinho does work well with Dan
Rincon. Take careful notice of the part around the 12:30 mark where
the drummers push things up a notch and Dwyer lets them shine as his
guitar gets even more blown out and droney. I think somewhere in here
he switches to his keyboard/synth as well, though it's hard to
distinguish the two from each other because of how many effects he's
been using on his guitar. Make no mistake, the rest of Live
is also straight fire,
as the kids say—'Gelatinous Cube' and 'Toe Cutter/Thumb Buster' are
beasts that show off the dynamics of these live legends and will
flatten your chest if you aren't careful. It's not all
about 'Contraption', though
'Contraption' is all that*,
as the kids say.
With its mix of
old songs with new (and brand-new!) songs Live served as a
bridging of the gap between the mid-era of the band and the
modern-era. This has the side effect of leaving me wishing for a
proper live album from the mid-era, and of course, also a
proper live album from the modern-era Face Stabber lineup with
Tomas Dolas on keyboards. However I get the distinct feeling I am
inspecting the teeth of a horse I was just gifted, so I better stop
before I get out my magnifying glass and tweezers and start picking
nits, too. It's hard to imagine any Oh Sees fan not adoring Live,
though if you're like I used to be and you don't see a point to live
shows, this may be the cure for your ignorance.
*...What's that? Kids don't say “all that” anymore? Hmph. What about groovy? Why are you shaking your head and walking away? Hello...?
No comments:
Post a Comment