October 11, 2007

Memphis has a noodly, Barber Rock God first jam. Meh. The second jam has a darkness about it that permeates much of fall 2007. Magner in particular here is great, and Barber has some great phrasing around the edges as well. This so fluidly turns into Orch theme, and even though it’s a long, drawn-out intro, I don’t mind it too much. Very nice jam. The middle jam in Orch Theme has a lot of potential. Allen busts out the thirst quenchers, and the band has some nice stuff going on. Unfortunately, this sort of weaves in and out of Orch Theme in a weird way, and I feel like the band just wasn’t on the same page here. Second Orch Theme jam features a lot of Magner and Brownstein, and the entire band feels like they’ve regrouped instantly from that first Orch Theme jam. As they increase in pace and intensity, they seem to be communicating better and better. This will keep your head bobbing, as I can only imagine Marc was on stage. The jam out of Munchkin begins uptempo and drops to half-time. After the half-time drop, they hit on this absolutely ethereal, dreamy progression. This is gorgeous, and I wish they expanded on it more. The jam out of Liquid Handcuffs is almost entirely forgettable DNB.

Mulberry’s features two straightforward type 1 jams that each are about 3 minutes long. Skip. The Caterpillar jam is a long, winding jam that feels like it could drop into Caterpillar ending at any moment. I enjoyed most of this, even though it’s very safe play. The Caterpillar ending has the proper G > Eb progression from Brownstein. Crickets begins with a basic I-VII-VI-VII progression, thought they quickly ditch this and make it sound as though they’re headed for Crickets peak. That doesn’t happen and they instead switch into a DNB style jam as they head toward Shelby peak. I thought this jam was okay, though honestly the best part was the first few minutes. The jam out of Shelby back into Crickets has a distinctly eerie, ominous feeling to it. They drift into phrygian, middle-eastern jamming for parts of this. Magner still seems very focused on the Mr. Balloonhands sample, but this jam is fantastic even in spite of that. There is some phenomenal work here from Barber and Magner, and the communication is great as well. The second jam in Crickets is the epitome of jammy jamband jams. The band gets fixated on a particularly uninteresting theme, and this bored me to tears. The Morph jam to end the show is exactly the same jam you’ve heard a thousand times.

Highlights: Memphis (2*), Orch (2**), Munchkin**, Caterpillar, Shelby**