, attached to 2000-09-11

Review by n00b100

n00b100 Set 1: Roadrunner is a nice surprise as a one-off (I guess James Murphy isn't the only guy who's heard all the Modern Lovers hits), but the rest of the set is unexceptional until the Ya Mar/Stash 1-2 punch. The former is a charming example of Ya Mar's breezy Type I jam, with some stop-starts thrown in for good measure; the latter an underrated version that briefly mixes a dreamy major-chord jam into the usual minor-chord stew that is a Stash jam. They've played better first sets, but they've most certainly played worse ones, and Ya Mar/Stash should certainly be heard.

Set 2: Chalk Dust leads off the proceedings, and the band wastes no time getting down to business with a nice and fast-paced jam that peaks with a ferocious, almost *violent* Trey solo (and threatens to morph into Llama at one point) before returning to the main CDT theme. Then, as CDT comes to a close, the band rolls into a spaced-out mini-jam that winds down like a toy running out of battery power, from which Twist emerges. This is a really nifty Twist (which I believe should show up on the jam chart), somewhat analogous to the 7/14/13 version that I unfairly slagged in my review of that show, in that it doesn't escape the usual boundaries of Twist but energetically explores every bit of the space inside those boundaries, Fish really driving the jam forward near the end.

Twist winds down, and we get another spacey jam, Trey quietly soloing as Page and Mike create a soundscape behind him, which leads quite naturally into Piper. The Piper jam is on fire from the start (an attempt to sing the Piper lyrics mid-jam is, to say the least, not entirely successful), then slows briefly before the band rolls into a groovier, yet no less quicksilver jam that then gives way to a stomping beat from Fish and some equally powerful work from Mike. The jam slows down further, as Fish switches up the tempo and Page takes over while Trey lets loose a bevy of loops, then speeds up again for one last thrill before collapsing into (yep) a spacey jam (which, it should be noted, at least naturally occurs from the actual previous jam), gets almost industrial, and then morphs into What's The Use?. What's The Use crashes around for a few minutes, then gives way into one final spacey jam (which at least has an interesting little passage at the end, elvish notes from Page mixing with a Mike-led mini-groove), from which YEM emerges. YEM is totally fine.

Final thoughts: A strong show, especially for 2000. Much of the playing in the second set is really quite good (especially in the Twist/Piper combo), and the spacey passages from song to song are neat (if a bit stagnant creatively, cf this @waxbanks blog post), and Ya Mar/Stash are better than you can reasonably expect from a first set. Highly recommended.


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