September 27, 2014

Frog Legs is fine. The first Dribble jam has a nice downtempo jam in it, and Magner has a solid main theme. Barber is a little more all-over-the-place than would be ideal here, but I think Magner and Brownstein have enough working that it salvages the jam for me. The jam out of Dribble into 7-11 is corny 70’s-ish disco. This does nothing for me. The 7-11 jam starts with the same disco-y stuff. Near the end of the jam, they get into a nice I-VII-VI-VII progression, and while I think this is nice, it doesn’t really make up for the several minutes of boredom that preceded it. Punk rock Kitchen Mitts is a neat concept, but I don’t think the execution is great.

The Lai jam is really solid, or rather the end of it is. I think most of the jam itself is pretty average, but the peak progression they hit is beautiful, and worth a relisten. The first several minutes of the Caterpillar jam feature Magner and Brownstein trying, desperately, to pull something interesting out of Barber. Barber can’t seem to decide on what he wants to do here, and the frustration is palpable. Just pick a lane. Near the end of this jam, they get into a nice little major key jam, featuring Brownstein using some slap basslines to decent effect. I don’t think this saves the jam, but it’s slightly better than what they were doing immediately prior. This sounds like they’re sort of trying to do a Confrontation peak fakeout, but not completely. The first Boop jam is not bad, but way, way too quick. This is like a 3-minute jam, and is never really fleshed out. Second Boop jam transitions from the usual blues funk into a Caterpillar ending nicely, even if the jam itself is fairly forgettable. The On Time jam begins with the typical midtempo disco funk that it so often does. Transition to Lai is fine, but nothing all that interesting.

Crickets first jam is alright. This feels a bit like treading water to me. There’s nothing that’s not necessarily bad here, it just doesn’t grip me in the way Crickets first jams often do. They maintain the typical “spacey trance” vibe, but I don’t think this really evolves or grows in any interesting ways. Peak is fine. The second Crickets jam begins with some really neat melodic phrasing from Magner. However, they don’t really build on this theme at all, and the next several minutes wind up with some meandering attempts at cohesion. The 42 jam is pretty solid. This is inside the box dance jamming, but they’ve got a very nice groove, and there’s some cool interplay between Magner and Barber at parts. The Orch Theme jam is short, but is pretty well done. Magner uses his “detuned string” patch that I really like, and Brownstein has some really nice bass work here. Barber’s play is restrained, and they all seem to be communicating very nicely. The jam out of Tempest gets very fast and dark, but ultimately I don’t think there’s much of interest here. The jam out of Ape is okay. They get into a nice trance groove, but ultimately there’s nothing here that piques my interest, yet again. A six-minute long Helix encore is sort of insulting. Thanks for nothing.

Highlights: Dribble (1), Lai, 42, Orch Theme