December 29, 2014

The opening jam has kind of a bluesy sound to it. This isn’t an awful way to start the show if you’re into that sound, but beyond that this isn’t all that noteworthy. B&C remains in pretty prototypical jamband territory for much of it, until about the 10-minute mark where they shift to a much more electronic sound. After a few minutes, they get dramatically darker and more dissonant, and Magner has some great phrasing here. This is actually pretty neat, and results in a cool transition into Voices intro. The Voices jam leaves me pretty nonplussed. The Pilin jam is actually really interesting for once. Barber and Magner both have some solid stuff here, and Brownstein’s basslines remind me in spots of the Aquatic Ape middle section, which is neat. The first Memphis jam is fairly straightforward, and turns into the usual Barber rock god stuff. Not for me, but not awful either. The second jam begins with Magner using a pretty simple cutoff/resonant modulated saw wave lead, but the phrasing he has here is absolutely choice. Barber’s meandering playing doesn’t do much for me in this segment, but as they increase in tempo, he seems to lock in with Brownstein much better. I don’t know that this gets much better from here as an overall jam. It’s not terrible, but not something I’d listen to again. The Tempest jam turns into an upbeat breakbeat jam that feels a lot like treading water before the return to B&C ending. Meh.

Uber Glue is standard. The HDPF 1 jam is about as straightforward as it can be. The second jam is actually very solid. They have an almost Caterpillar ending-y feel for a good chunk of the jam, which is more than welcome from me. The segue into I-Man is very nice, and very natural. There’s no token 1st jam here, which is nice. I would rather they extend the third jam than force a 1- or 2-minute type 1 jam. Unfortunately, they do add the 2nd jam here, which is in fact the couple minutes of type 1. The third I-Man jam turns into some dark and nasty stuff. Magner has this great arp patch that he messes with for a good portion of this, and it lands in a huge way. Brownstein and Barber get in on the dissonance here, and the whole band crafts a really unique sounding jam. This is flat-out awesome, and easily the best part of the show. The jam out of I-Man and back into House Dog is fine, though after what came before it this is something of a disappointment. A 10-minute Catalyst doesn’t sound an ideal way to end a set after a lot of filler, but that’s where we are. This is about as straightforward as this can be, and obviously Spy is standard.

Highlights: B&C, Pilin, I-Man (3**)