March 06, 2009

Uber Glue to begin the show is jamless. The jams in Morph and Basis are both straightforward, paint-by-numbers stuff, as is the first Memphis jam. The second Memphis immediately hits an uptempo groove that's better than the jams that preceded it almost immediately. Brownstein is playing a similar theme to his Rock Candy bassline, but the stuff that's going on around him is cool enough that I let that slide. Around the 14:15 mark, they have a great, syncopated jam going on with a lot of rhythmic interplay between the band members. Cool stuff. The RC jam is a straightforward dance jam, although I generally enjoyed most of it.

Rockafella has a short middle jam to begin the second set. What follows is among the best Mirrors the band has ever played, which is impressive considering they debuted it the night before. This begins at a hip-hop tempo out of the minor key section of the song with Brownstein on MIDI keyboard. This has a cool exploratory feel, with Magner messing around with an LFO lead. Around the 10:30 mark, the band shifts deliberately uptempo into a dance jam, and they make their way toward Cyclone. The band locks into a great groove, with Magner doing his share of psychedelic layering on the top end of the jam. From here, they build a fantastic peak before dropping into Cyclone. Awesome. The jam out of Cyclone lasts only 4-5 minutes, and while it had me nodding my head, this is an obvious jam into Spaga for a long, long time. Some fun thirst quenchers here and there, however. Spaga begins with a DNB jam that shifts to half-time after only a couple of minutes. After some noodling in half-time, the band makes a transparent and obvious transition back toward Morph. The rest of this is pretty straightforward. They jam out of the ending of Morph into Astronaut. I like the concept of this jam more than the substance. SITA is straightforward. Second Astronaut jam is at least better, though only by a bit. Encore is jamless.

Highlights: Memphis (2**), Rock Candy, Mirrors**, Cyclone, Astronaut (2)

A very good end to a sick,sick winter tour. High tempo, high energy show. Bisco in the South is really a very fun experience coming from this pasty white Canucklehead. See you at the Caves - Fall 2021.

Gold: MEMPHIS, Cyclone ~>, Astronaut, Morph 1

Silver: Basis, ~>Spaga, Morph 2, Rock Candy, ~>Magellan reprise

Bronze: Mirrors ~>, AD ~> , Rockafella