February 13, 2009

<< I think this is my favorite show from the Disco Biscuits that I did not attend , besides my 1st in '97 and 200th at the Caves last year >>

Nice review TMac, I'll do the other weird stuff :)

~ 3 sets + a 'Fella encore ~THE MAGS SOLO DURING THE END OF WAVES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ~ every single song is in A quality land technicality, in setlist architecture, energy of the situation, their palpable happiness to be there and how this show sounds better each listen. it takes a good 20 times to hear all meat. ~ venue quality = helps so much ~ this, to me, is Allen's best drumming of the year and possibly all of 2.0 Biscuits ~ PEOPLE!......there are a total of 2 in-set stops/pauses in the whole freakin' show lol (not counting set breaks). There are 22 songs no less, most running over 10 minutes easily. This is pure 100% Blissflow. ~ there is a very good video of these 2 nights! taped by an employee on his day off. used: Canon DC50 DVD camcorder with post matrix recording sync [DSBD + dpa 4021's FOB. (use that info to find it; I'll get yelled at if I lay down a link lol) ~ one of the headiest, funky 1st sets possible. the 'Lunar Pursuit' does not get much better than this. The Dribble mind-blowing intro! ~ recording quality. ~ Barber's playing/ Marc's steering of the ship and it's endless song variations,/see Allen in the 4th point and Mr. Mags creating haunting soundscapes, untzing to the oldies, his funk on the hammond and 'ole faithful....the grand piano. he is an octopus you can bring home to Mother. ~ the inverted SOTW ~ so much music. ~ lastly, YOU !

9.90 / 10

{{ you will need the strain of Life for these 2 shows; one to keep the euphoric tendencies strong while not taking all of your energy away::::}}

[Chemdawg] Denver's Finest ! and winner of the Cannabis Cup. I've heard thc counts as high as 32%. My 1/4 was 28% and well, I think I landed(?) NOT FOR KIDS ONLY :) This heady sativa herb doesn't have the clearest parents but it most likely comes from a Thai & Nepalese....a good sign.

Be well. In the spell. "" I'm In Heaveeeeeennnnnnnnn ""

Uber Glue technically has a “jam” out of it, though this is essentially nothing more than a Shem-Rah Boo intro jam. This begins feeling like it may just be 30 seconds of filler before dropping into Shem-Rah. Instead, the band plays a full on 5-minute long jam, complete with a huge peak. There is a lot of sort of spacey breakbeat stuff going on, but around the 3-minute mark is where this gets to the next level. Barber comes up with an absolutely fantastic riff, and he likes it so much that he winds up playing it during the Shem-Rah composition a few times as well. The final 3-4 minutes of the SRB track and the first 5 minutes of the Lunar Pursuit track consist of what begins as essentially a rock jam over a trance beat. This is mostly just Barber and Brownstein, and the first several minutes of this are fairly boring. Magner is primarily playing arps, gates, and pads as Barber is at center stage in the jam. This gets marginally more interesting at the 3:30 mark in Lunar Pursuit when Magner takes more of a prominent role in the jam. Surprise, surprise. The next two minutes are decent, but things really start to pick up around the 5:20 mark, when the band ditches this theme. What results is a driving trance jam, beginning initially with a thumping kick from Allen, and a monotonous, intense baseline from Brownstein. This whole section is borderline psytrance, and the resulting effect is very cool. Magner again takes on a more prominent role with some great lead stuff, and Barber is resigned to mostly hanging out in the very high upper registers with some plucky guitar notes here and there. This is absolutely fantastic. Lunar begins with another fast, driving trance jam with Magner playing some great eighth-note repeating patterns. The next four minutes or so are just balls-to-the-wall trance, and include really great playing from everybody with the sole exception being Barber, who is sort of just there. Around the 19-minute mark, they switch things up into a DNB beat for the switch to Dribble, and thereafter Brownstein teases Chilled Briefly heavily, beginning at 0:29 in the Dribble track. I believe the rest of the band sort of joins in, but honestly I can’t even remember the music from the rest of the band in the actual “song” the one time they played it. Either way, this is definitely a tease. The first few minutes of the dribble jam are fairly straightforward, though not bad. Around the 9-minute mark or so, Allen drops a four on the floor beat, and the band shift uptempo yet again. There were moments that this felt like it could have gone towards Cyclone or Tempest. Instead, as the track changes, Brownstein drops the familiar bassline and they head to Tricycle. The Tricycle jam begins with a laid-back breakbeat, and this is evocative of 1.0 jams where the band sort of just finds its footing for a bit. Magner has some great background melodic work going that serves as a counterpoint to Barber, and at the 7:30 mark Allen brings the beat in with a little more prominence, while Brownstein switches to the MIDI keyboard and uses a great Reese bass with phaser for a fantastic and cool effect. Magner flips on an arp which sounds like it’s at a 1/32 gate – this arp is probably best known from the psytrance 2/15 I-Man/Ladies segment, but here it’s just as cool. Around the 9-minute mark, Barber switches on to some chords and Magner’s melodic work becomes a little more prominent as well. The next few minutes are very, very cool, including some descending psychedelic, atmospheric effects from Magner. The remainder of this jam gets darker, more dissonant, and frankly a little less interesting as it gets closer to the Reactor peak, but overall this is still a very cool jam.

Rivers features the usual, short 2-3 minute jam. The Memphis first jam begins with the usual hip-hop stuff common around this time, although Allen’s e-drums only last a couple minutes. Nothing really noteworthy going on here. The jam out of Liquid Handcuffs is fine. This is a DNB jam switched to half-time at the end. Again, not bad, but not noteworthy either. The second Memphis jam has some very cool stuff as it begins with what sounds a lot like a Basis intro, only to shift uptempo in the darker, exotic sound of Abraxas. Magner shifts on to his rolling arp patch around 3-minute mark, and while this got a little stagnant before the switch to Abraxas, I enjoyed it nonetheless. Almost immediately out of Abraxas, they lock into a fun dance groove. Barber begins with a minimal riff that he eventually adds some chords to as part of a call-and-response with himself. Magner’s plucky synths alternate with an ascending sine wave lead for a great effect, and Brownstein and Allen hold down a really fantastic pocket. It will be impossible not to bob your head along to this jam. Eventually they start making a rather telegraphed transition to Waves, but I don’t even necessarily mind that all that much here. The jam out of Waves comes once again out of the “Coronado swam like hell on fire” section, and quickly switches up into a Moshi-Fameus jam. The MF jam is okay, but suffers from the usual limitations. That said, once the rest of the band comes back in they lead a high-energy dance jam toward RLH. Nice. The RLH jam begins with Magner on the “2/15 I-Man arp,” and while I enjoyed this dance jam, it just didn’t last very long. 4-5 minutes or so and they’re already into the intro for Orch Theme. I noted this as a highlight, but would have been nice for them to stretch their legs a bit more. The jam in Orch Theme begins with a nice dance groove and Magner with some interesting melodic work on a plucky synth. This doesn’t evolve all that much, but eventually shifts into a breakbeat jam, and Barber has some really nice guitar work around the 8-9 minute mark. It almost sounds for a bit like they are headed to an inverted Ladies, but that obviously does not happen and they return instead to the ending of Orch Theme. The jam back into RLH is just fine.

Tamarin Alley, jamless per usual. The Reactor jam begins with several minutes of “cacophonous” jamming that really do absolutely nothing for me. Around the 9-minute mark they drop to half-time and play the progression to the ending of 7-11. Not sure if this was intentional or they just wound up in this, but I guess this is a “tease.” Around the 10:45 mark, Magner teases “Imperial March,” as the band gets into a new section of the jam. The resulting jam has a solid dance groove, though there’s nothing remarkable going on here. At the end of the Reactor track and beginning of the Abyss track, the band brings things down to almost nothing but a steady kick beat. There’s a very brief build back into the beginning of Abyss. The jam out of Abyss winds up in a VI-VII-I progression almost immediately, and features Barber doing a bunch of soaring guitar stuff. The jam out of Story is fine, but nothing special. Rockafella has a very short jam in it out of the “rolling down the window” section that turns into a brief little DNB jam. This is actually not bad, even though it’s very short. I noted this as a highlight despite its brevity, because I like the overall vibe and I like the attempt.

Highlights: Uber Glue*, Shem-Rah**, Lunar**, Tricycle*, Memphis (2), Abraxas*, Waves, RLH (1), Rockafella