Tuesday, November 21, 2006
This is not New Rave!
Junior Boys are a Canadian band, adding to the ever-lengthening list of bands from Canada I've seen in the last twelve months. Indeed, exactly twelve months since I saw the AMAZING Wolf Parade in Berlin. I had no idea about Junior Boys up until a week ago when I was jetsetting it in Berlin with Queen Almost Tropical (I had an excellent time, thanks!) and she played their current album, So This Is Goodbye while we were tucking in to dinner. We played it a further three times successively - it was so perfect and pleasing as background music, but also features some body jerking choons for the dancefloor while melancholic enough for heavy bedroom listening, with each ensuing listen unearthing complexities in its electronic soundscapes.
I was very happy to see on my return from Berlin that JBs would be playing the following Thursday, which was, in fact, last Thursday. The gig was at Cargo, which is a nice, if seldom used, gig venue. After enduring 130db reggae before they came on, the keyboards were far too quiet considering their prominence in Junior Boys' material. After a bit of heckling from the enthusiastic crowd the keyboards were turned up in the mix, despite looks of bemusement on the part of singer/bassist/guitarist Jeremy Greenspan. There were several of these bemused looks over the course of their performance. At one point Jeremy said "Hey, you guys realise that Hot Chip aren't playing tonight?" (the band had just completed a support tour for the hyped electro outfit). I think they are only just coming to terms with the fact that things are really kicking off for them now, that people actually want to see them. Their single, In The Morning got the biggest cheers when its signature opening synth riff was played, cue: more disbelief that people know their songs and dance with their eyes closed to them.
The disbelief might have been tiredness, as synthster Matt Didemus seemed delirious after the long tour. But this tour-closer was not an illusion - Juniors Boys are loved and set to become more and more successful. They are booked in to play Kings College on 20th February, with more UK/Europe dates sure to be added soon. Don't miss them. Here's their MySpace.
posted by Unknown at 11/21/2006 08:13:00 pm
1 Comments:
Elizabeth said...
that was the best dinner ever.
..and CRAZY that the keyboards were too quiet! it's like the heart's core of the Junior Boys! if anything they were too loud at White Trash. In a good way. So glad you had a good time at the gig. Excellent depiction of them too, they seem so down to earth and unaware of how bloody good they are. Maybe that is just how Matt plays - he seemed the same way in Berlin. I never really saw someone making "keyboard faces" before.
xo
dude you have to get back to me about the 3.50 thai place. and the shoe shop! Miss you alot.
