Atlas Sound @ Noise Pop

Atlas Sound
SF Noise Pop Festival
Great American Music Hall
San Francisco, CA
February 26, 2010

I have already gone on record w/my strongly-held view that Bradford Cox is one of very few actual geniuses working in popular music today. A few months back, I was delighted to learn that he’s also a warm & engaging performer. Both aspects were again made plain on Friday night at GAMH.

This current iteration of Atlas Sound was “just” Bradford, solo, w/acoustic guitar, his (still-incongruous) harmonica, & about a dozen effects pedals & loopers. From these ingredients, Bradford crafted his sound-sculptures right there in front of us, he built them up & then he broke them back down. This music was rich & layered & sonorous & deep. Except for when it wasn’t. Because the lush, processed artifice could switch off in an eyeblink, leaving only the reedy voice, the minor chords, the harmonica whining. On a dime, this guy all alone can turn from Atlas Sound into Neil fucking Young. & when that shift happens, it’s dynamic, it’s poignant, it’s goddamn masterful. Bradford Cox whipping up High Art in real time; he’s like the iron chef I swear to god.

& yet all the while, he makes it look so easy. Bradford onstage is unassuming. He is chatty, spontaneous, just steadfastly genuine. He’s telling little stories, cracking jokes, taking requests (including mine, yay!). He’s plainly reveling in the singular moment of Now, & we are there in it with him. That feels like some magical shit. & when, late in the show, there are scattered outbursts of affection from the audience well, that feels appropriate. Because Bradford is sharing the love, & only some kind of an asshole would fail to reciprocate. I mean, right?

It was in that rather glad aura that I actually forgot to be taking notes. So I’m going to be a bit shy on the actual details here. I’m pretty sure he played for about two solid hours. I remember “Sheila” & “Walkabout,” but also a lot of songs I didn’t know, so they’re probably new. Um, he played “An Orchid.” Oh, & his dad was there.

It feels like he played about ten songs for the encore, although it may have been substantially fewer. He did play “Quarantined,” (that was my request), and he played something that we’re not supposed to tell anybody he played. (bc Lockett will get mad, so that’s all I’m gonna say about that one!) He closed out with “Kid Klimax,” and then “Logos.”

I understand that Deerhunter is about to get busy w/ new projects again, including the opening slot on Spoon’s tour. That particular circus comes to our town on April 13 at the Fox in Oakland. You going?

Take It From Me -- Track #11 -- Atlas Sound

“Quarantined”
by Atlas Sound
from
Let the Blind Lead Those Who Can See But Cannot Feel
February 2008

Yes, I am again pulling from the 2008 album (see track 3 on this mix).

The signature sound here is that popping, wet reverb on the vocal consonants –it makes my skin tingle!

As discussed elsewhere here, I was fortunate enough to see Bradford & co, on November 3, & this song was a highlight.

Quarantined - Atlas Sound

Take It From Me -- Track #3 -- Atlas Sound

“Ativan” by Atlas Sound
from Let the Blind Lead Those Who Can See But Cannot Feel
February 2008

Like I said, I’m still working my way through last year. This year’s Logos is also excellent, & may well appear on next year’s mix. So.

Anyway, usually the 1st thing that hooks me into any bit of recorded music is some flavor or texture in the way the thing is produced. e.g., I most certainly do love the swirling, sonic smear of Atlas Sound, solo project of Bradford Cox (of Deerhunter). Often, a song’s lyrics are the last thing to get my attention, but the opening lines here (“I slept til I threw up.”) are, um, kind of arresting yeah?

That said, I really just love the big, lush reverb that pervades this album. This music has direct antecedents in My Bloody Valentine, Jesus & Mary Chain, Velvet Underground (in reverse chronological order), all of which I will almost certainly address in future postings here.

Ativan - Atlas Sound

Atlas Sound

Great American Music Hall
San Francisco, CA
November 3, 2009

Bradford Cox is playing hooky from his day job with Deerhunter.

I definitely think of Deerhunter as a quote-unquote experimental rock band because they do question & expand the usual boundaries of the form. It's just that they often do so in stealthy ways, loading relatively conventional songs chock full of Trojan-horse surprises.

But that's another day's discussion. Tonight, Mr. Cox is engaged in his *other* project, Atlas Sound. I've spent a lot of time with the "Let the Blind Lead..." album, where the "experimentation" is overt & obvious. There, the "band" does not produce "songs," so much as aural tableaux vivants. Dream-ish snapshots, half-obscured, evocative & lush. The new album, "Logos," is somewhat less insistent on its own iconoclasm, but still: Altas Sound is processed sound, distorted & manipulated beyond easy recognition, repeatedly confounding of the listener's expectations. Delicious. Hell, it's magically delicious.

In Atlas Sound, Mr. Cox wields the fact of recording & production itself as his primary musical instrument. There's a lengthy tradition for this sort of thing, & he has described this project as a venue for ideas ill-suited to the usual rock band format.

Well, OK fair enough. But I'd been wondering: now that he's touring Atlas Sound as a rock band, how does its essence translate back to a live performance context? Based on tonight's show, the short answer is: It thankfully doesn't. My concern had been that this concert would be all self-serious, & that the band would execute wan imitations of those rich & complex recordings.

But No. First of all, Bradford was jovial & warm from the start. I was completely thrown off as he cracked jokes, flirted brazenly, recruited an audience member to play tambourine, & cetera. So by the time he started playing acoustic guitar & a fucking harmonica, well, I had already been so utterly disarmed & seduced that I was ready to follow wherever he & Atlas Sound were planning to go. (To be fair, he did allay fears by promising to play "some really weird shit" later in the set.)

This was a thrilling show because, while everybody knew to expect "experimental" or Experimental or whatever, this band played nothing that fit easily into any such pigeonhole. Instead, we got ~80 minutes of veering madly from one modus to another, never settling anywhere comfortably, & all of it was just damn fun! Mr. Cox has a lot of electronics on the floor, including some fancy-ass sampling machines. So, e.g., the acoustic guitar could morph into a hammer dulcimer on crystal meth, the harmonica could transmogrify via god's own echo-box. Or, just as often, not. Because playing it clean & straight is just one more color in this artist's very big wheel. & just to not leave the stone unturned: Bradford Cox is a fucking bad-ass electric guitar player exclamation point.

One favorite moment among several: tonight's version of "Quarantined." Stripped of its popping reverb & (deliberately, ironically) cheesy sequencer, the song was suddenly driven by Bradford's surprisingly passionate & ultimately poignant vocal performance. A complete reinvention of a song I have well-known & well-loved. Outstanding.