March 01, 2009

Caves begins with a non-jam segue into Truckers Choice. Truckers has a jambandy jam into Magellan, with a Magellan drop that is absolutely butchered. Magellan jam is fine, but I really should emphasize just how badly played this Magellan composition is. Awful. Spraypaint is fine, but mostly filler. KOTW and Munchkin are both largely forgettable to me.

M80 begins the second set jamless. Rockafella has a solid jam despite it being very inside the box. Ladies begins with a highly digital jam, featuring lots of arp movement from Magner. For a bit it sounds like this will just be a digital jam and nothing more, until around the 7-minute mark where Barber adds a little call-and-response to the riff he’s playing. The response portion is this 4 note descending pattern that is done in a really clever, creative way. From here Brownstein starts playing a 3-chord progression that rounds out the theme, and Magner layers the top of the jam with washes and pads for a great, dreamy sound. This is one of my favorite versions of Ladies from 2009, and features Barber at his thematic best. Magner also has some really great stuff near the peak of this. After they finish peaking this, they move on to a transition into Liquid Handcuffs. The jam out begins with the typical DNB jam, but quickly if shifts to half-time. After the half-time shift, the band develops a great theme, primarily relying on Magner‘s very cool thematic, melodic work. This theme doesn’t really go anywhere, but Magner uses his LFO to facilitate a clever tempo increase near the end of the jam. The jam out of HAB is mostly forgettable, with the exception of the fact that a lot of this sounds like a straight up Air Song intro jam. They are playing the chord progression, and Magner even plays the same piano patch that he plays in Air Song. Not sure if this was deliberate or just a coincidence, but interesting nonetheless. The 42 jam has a fantastic beginning that sounds like German techno, but they quickly get away from this and head to the ending of HAB. Meh. The Flight section here is very extended and actually worth a listen as a rarity. Mitts to end the show is jamless.

Highlights: Rockafella, Ladies**, Liquid Handcuffs, HAB (Flight)