#URGE OVERKILL MOD#
Photos: Low, Memoryhouse The Mod Club – May 2, 2011 The Alternate Side has an interview and session. The National Post has a review of the show, while The Boston Globe and New Haven Advocate have interviews. The encore offered a bit of uplift, with Sparhawk not so subtly inquiring as to where one might acquire some pot and dedicating to us “Canada” before closing things out with a grand reading of “When I Go Deaf”, offering a most welcome bit of a catharsis and making the next four years – whether until the next election or when Low finally return again – seem just a bit more bearable. At that point he chastised his own country for taking to the streets to celebrate an assassination and lauded ours, only to be informed that we might not be far behind – at which point they closed out, perhaps appropriately given the topics of conversation, with “Murderer”. Adding to the atmosphere was the fact that Sparhawk didn’t speak a word to the audience through the entire show, and only then because he flubbed the intro to their final song. Perhaps the tension was just reflecting on the unspoken mood of the crowd, what with this being federal election night and the returns coming in over the course of their set not reflecting what the presumably left-leaning audience would have liked to see. It was slower, starker and aside from a few moments of lightness, if you hadn’t heard the record you might have thought the band was continuing on with the grim Drums And Guns aesthetic.
But most significant was that despite having released their warmest-sounding record in years and playing just about all of it over the course of the show, live it took on a decidedly different character. Okay, it was still all of the things noted above, but still surprising in a number of respects, not least of all that they were here as a quartet with Sparhawk’s compatriots from the Retribution Gospel Choir on bass on keys. So that their show opened exactly so with “Breaker” would serve as notice that the evening might not be so predictable. But handclaps and drum machines? Maybe not so much. I look forward to seeing and hearing them grow.Īsk people what they’d expect a Low show to sound like and they’d probably respond with one or all of: slow, solemn, with beautiful harmonies from Alan Sparhawk and Mimi Parker and maybe a guitar freakout or ten. But even so, as a preview of their debut full-length due out before the end of the year, it ably demonstrated why one of the premier record labels around would be so keen to get them under contract. And while this configuration certainly did what one would hope, filled out the sound and gave it some weight, it also made them more conventional-sounding not necessarily a bad thing, but when there was all that space, it left more to the imagination.
Nouvion, in particular, was clearly more comfortable in the role of frontwoman, even working some dance steps into the show.
#URGE OVERKILL FULL#
Perhaps in response, the Memoryhouse who took the stage on this evening were a full and proper band, with a rhythm section joining principals Evan Abeele and Denise Nouvion and made for a still low key but more confident band up there than the one I saw a few months ago. I first saw them back in December and while I liked much of what they were doing musically, those who criticized their live performances as being rather sleepy had a point. Support for the evening were local dreampop ensemble and recent Sub Pop signees Memoryhouse. It’s noteworthy that while that sequence of records confused and alienated much of their long-time fanbase – but won new devotees – blended together as they are on C’Mon they actually make a lot of sense and as such, it might be their most broadly satisfying record in some time. It predominantly resembles 2002’s Trust, with its warm, organic tones and relatively unadorned production, but you don’t have to dig too deep to uncover some of The Great Destroyer‘s overt rock moves or Drums And Guns‘ dark and crushing paranoia. And as a return, it feels like a “where we’ve been” over the last decade or so. The drought finally ended on Monday night at the Mod Club, however, with Duluth’s finest in town to support their latest effort C’Mon, their first in four years and that, I suppose, is all the explanation you’d need for why they haven’t visited. Low sightings in Toronto have been, well, low. It may not have seemed that long, what with them having been here supporting Wilco at Massey Hall in July 2007 and Alan Sparhawk having brought his Retribution Gospel Choir through town a number of times in the interim, but yes. Frank YangYou’re not wrong, it really had been forever since Low last headlined a show in Toronto – well over five years, to be exact.
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