The Tesseract

Attended the 2 day gig held in the Guiness Theatre at the Substation with my membersss, Sujin. Met Ed the tech guy there as well. The Tesseract gig was organised by Swilk and Styra from Wallworks Records.

In their own works, the Tesseract is a 2-day event showcasing the best in progressive Singapore music, organised by Swilk and Styra, supported by The Substation and sponsored by the National Arts Council. Featuring prominent artists involved in music employing traditional means and multimedia technologies, The Tesseract creates more novel approaches to sound and its performance. Beyond the aural domain, it provides a fully immersive experience through equal emphasis on the �live� visual component interlacing reiteratively with the music

For the 1st night, it was more of an electronic music affair or in hipper terms, laptop music. Thanks to the memberss being late, we missed the 1st 3 acts which included Analog Girl whom I wanna check out. I had downloaded her stuff which is pretty good. So was her live set as affirmed by Ed. After the intermission, Skrooloose aka Don Richmond played a set of electronic music, spliced with DJ Shadow-like drum breaks and Japanese koto(?) and drums. Nice. Me likes. He was followed by the last act, 3 Goddess (if I'm not wrong) which treated sound as a palette to paint their soundscapes. It was a sonic experiment at best or a patience-testing aural nightmare at worst. 3 guys staring at their laptops, tweaking some knobs here and there while their music/noise/tunes/whatever assaulted your senses. What I can never understand is just what the hell are they staring at the laptop for when they are playing live? It is just playing out the music they had programmed previously.

Things that a laptop musician is really doing while they are staring at the laptop, playing live
1. Trying very hard to look like they are actually doing something
2. Tripping while staring at their Windows Media Player as they had loaded some good grade LSD before performing
3. ICQ/ MSN-ing some friends who are still in Ibiza
4. Playing a pirated version of "Return of the King" PC game
5. Surfing porn

The 2nd night had several bands playing. As usual, the membersss and I were fashionably late so we missed the 1st act. We managed to catch Phorous which was pretty rockin', incorporating beats with guitars and bass. They had a singer who crooned on several songs though I thought his vocal style was too Top 40 for this type of music. Still, a good set.

They were followed by I Am David Sparkle which sounded like they had their Mogwai talisman burnt, mixed into their water and drunk like it's holy water. (Yeah, I had that as a kid; my mum said it would cure my flu...) In any case, they played several instrumentals, at once hypnotic and droning. The drummer was tight as shit. If he got an Afro, he'd be a deadringer for The Roots's drummer, Questlove. Their set was clearly loved as they received the loudest cheers from the crowd. Good stuff.

Astreal were up next. I have seen them play live in their different incarnations over the years. So, in a way, I wasn't really that all keen to see them live, thinking they have nothing much left to offer. Well, my expectations weren't exactly overturned in a dramatic way. They still churned out their usual abrasive noise pop stylings. However, with their new drummer, Ery A and new guitarist, Nick Chan, they seemed to be much more aggressive and tighter as an unit. Overall, they put up a short but enjoyable set.

I must say the disappointment for me was BigRed.Moment as I have heard their mp3, "If She" and loved it. Their set was extremely cluttered with way too many instruments going at one time. There wasn't any clarity between each individual players. Whilst the trumpet player added some interesting parts here and there, he was often drowned out by the rest of the band. One thing I never got was the doode squatting in a corner, mucking on his Kaoss Pad 2. Methinks he added nothing to the overall effect while creating more... ahem... chaos to the proceedings. Twiddling on it for one or two songs is fine. The whole friggin' set?!

By the way, Duran Duran played on the 16th which was the 2nd night of the event. Did any of you guys go? Everyone now. "Ahh, it'll take a little time, might take a little crime to come undone..."