April 25, 2015

Strobelights begins with a very upbeat funk jam. This isn’t terrible, but I also don’t necessarily get all that interested in these kinds of jams. This sounds like a billion other generic jambands playing “dance music,” and it’s just not interesting. With that said, the slide into Air Song is fantastic and really well done. The jam out of Air Song has Allen dropping the e-kick early on, and they have a few different portions of the jam here that are nice. Around the 10-minute mark, I felt like maybe they were headed for Bombs. This is a very Allen and Magner heavy jam, and I’m here for it. Spacebird has a very bizarre transition that hurts to hear. I’m not even sure I understand what happened here, but something is just way, way off. The jam out is okay, but frankly I think it’s basically interchangeable with the Air Song jam preceding it, and that’s not always what I’m looking for (nor is it here). The jam out of Buddha is very nice and features some great lush pads from Magner around the 9-minute mark. At 10:17, Brownstein hits on a very typical Biscuits progression, but the melodic work around it from Magner, as well as the harmonic play of Barber is absolutely fantastic. This is gloriously beautiful in a very melancholic way, and it works so unbelievably well. The first Boop jam is pretty basic, and forgettable. The jam out is some dark, trancy dance music that is fantastic. The Buddha peak is pretty uncomfortable, especially when Barber botches it. Thanks, Babz. Shimmy is a very odd song for an encore. Seven minutes of composition is not really what I’m looking for in an encore. Such is life.

Highlights: Air Song*, Buddha**, Boop (2*)