February 22, 2006

The opening Astronaut has no SITA jam, and the main Astronaut jam is really nice. They lock into a fantastic groove, and even though this is a little more jambandy that I would like, I think what they do works well – even the more shreddy Barber stuff near the end. Sweating Bullets is standard and jamless. Crystal Ball is jamless. Shelby has a pretty straightforward, forgettable DNB jam. AC2B first jam never really gets the opportunity to breathe. AC2B second is opened up a little bit more, but they never land on any theme here that really grabs me.

Commercial Amen is standard. Caterpillar here is a fairly straightforward midtempo jam. This is not bad, but has nothing all that noteworthy either. The jam out of Abyss is probably the longest to date at this point in calendar year 2006, and features a driving march from Allen and Marc. Magner briefly jumps on the angel choir patch. This is not bad, and I’ll note it as a highlight, but effectively this is a 6+ minute long jam on the ending progression for Caterpillar. It’s clear the band is still learning with one another, but this this is really the first time in 2006 where I felt like a glimpse of what would come in the next couple of years was seen. The SBMC uses the old jam format of four bars of 6/4, followed by two bars of 4/4. While I think this jam is actually pretty neat at parts (especially the sort of happy, Blissco portion of this jam as they near the return to the ending), I always felt like this format really boxed them in creatively (particularly Brownstein). Strawberry Girl is standard. Robots first jam has a really fantastic groove to it, and Magner comes up with this very neat riff that isn’t even necessarily the focal point of the jam. I’m not sure what to call this patch, but it’s like a spacy harmonica or something, and I love the feel of all of this. Second jam is the usual fast-paced DNB, but I don’t think they ever really land on any interesting themes here – just fast playing for the sake of playing fast. Encore is not for me.

Highlights: Astronaut, Abyss, Spacebird, Robots (1)