[Live] Sled Island Kickoff: No Age + guests

So, much like everything in life, personal music politics (yes, even those! Wait, it might just be me that has those, but anyways, I digress) are subject to slight hypocrisy every now and again.

"What does this have to do with No Age?" you might wonder.

See also: "What's this I hear about you guys doing endorsement deals?"

See also: "Is this going to be another long anti-Pitchfork rant? Because then I'm leaving."

The answer to all those points, and more, lies beyond this magical gateway of wonder you see just to your left. The one edged with delicious feedback and vocal layers and sprinkled with a touch of avant-noise dust. No...you missed it. Your other left. A bit more...closer...too far! THERE!

Once the distracting faeries and candy-coloured fog has cleared (magical gateways always seem to have this, though at least this one has no annoying rhyming jingle accompaniment), you see a crowded, dimly-lit rock pub with a small stage set across from the booths. There is a sign reading "No Beatniks" above the bar. You might recognize this place...after all, you've been here before, if only in that Sunset Rubdown live review that WHYH did way back.

The place is Broken City; the DJ sucks, except when someone temporarily distracted him from his 70's/80's songs long enough to throw on Mudhoney's "Suck You Dry" for an all-too-brief reprieve from generic radio rock (this probably didn't happen, but I rather like the idea of some mysterious caped crusader sweeping in to knock out the guy that thinks that the crowd at a No Age show are quite obviously fans of Heart-ripoff bands >.>).

You are there, very much because of the force in indie music who you have sworn to revile and loathe for all eternity (especially after that shameful and pathetically shallow-minded review of the new Wolf Parade album...more on that later >.>).

Yes, I owe Pitchfork for my own personal discovery of No Age; I'll give credit where credit is due. This is where the hypocrisy comes in: though I think their outlook towards music, their elitist posturing, and the crippling nature of said outlook on the state of indie music today is somewhat as ridiculous as the gargantuan influence of dinosaur Rolling Stone was back in the day, I generally don't disagree with them when they say something is pretty good. The exception to this is when they gave Justin Timberlake's Futuresex album an 8+ score, whereupon I decided that the blog's fancy touring budget was obviously funded by nefarious means. Apparently, they do endorsement deals too (once again, more on that later >.>).

Anyways, this is ruining the mood, so ignore it as a long, Shakespearean Aside.

The opening acts are perfect warm-ups; excellent local band The Dirty Dirty North (ex. Pants Situation, with the same hooks, more percussion, and more moxie) bring the rock like only they know how, getting the crowd energized and pumped, while Toronto-based progressive no-wavers dd/mm/yyyy (pronounced Day Month Year) clearly remind everyone that anyone expecting traditional verse/chorus/verse song structures devoid of layered effects had better go home. The pummeling of soundscapes immersing an at-capacity bar in sonic texture until you feel it like a solid presence in the air around you is also a good lead-in to the sensory attack of No Age.

Between the arresting energy and passion of the two men onstage, the fever-dream of montage images projected over the scene with lo-fi pixelation and fragmentation, and the kick-to-the-chest of tightly interwoven effects, feedback, vocals, thrashing guitar, percussion, and sheer volume , one doesn't know where to focus, where to look, or listen...it's let go and be taken over by the experience, or perish trying to fight it.

And truthfully, it's a hell of a lot more fun to give in and, to borrow drummer/vocalist Dean Spunt's expression, "lose your shit".

An hour and a half later, partially deaf, disheveled, and feeling almost as if you've been hit with a wave of sound before nearly drowning in it, you leave the tiny bar, a big stupid grin slapped across your face. There's no way you could regret it.

And this is only day one of a four-day multivenue sprawling festival curated by none other than Pavement's Scott Kannberg (i.e. Spiral Stairs) featuring some of the brightest local and not-so-local talents around (Chad Vangaalen to Mother Mother to Wire to Mogwai).

I can safely say I've never been quite so happy that I live in Calgary.


~Ju

P.S: the endorsement deals aren't true. Not a word. Well...unless you count being offered a free Zune in order to market-test the thing. However, in my defense, I state that any and all opinion stated on here in relation to the product will be completely honest. I'm quite neutral when it comes to mp3 players, being a vinyl-junkie and all. XD

Dirty Dirty North
http://myspace.com/thedirtydirtynorth

dd/mm/yyyy
http://myspace.com/ddmmyyyy

No Age
http://www.myspace.com/nonoage