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February 26, 2008
Neon Lights: Crystal Stilts
As previously threatened, this is the week in which I go over the bands playing Saturday night's Neon Lights show at Galapagos in minute detail. The first and only group of native Brooklynites on the the bill for Saturday's show will be the great, gloomy Crystal Stilts. I was unaware of the band when I stumbled into their coveted slot as an opening act for Kiwi legends, the Clean. They are sort of a conundrum. There's lots of space surrounding everything in the mix, but it's still urgent and vital. It just sounds like that vitality is happening in occurring in the direct center of a very large cave or something. It was glibly suggested to me at the show that they were "the Jesus and Mary Clean," combining the echoed legend of the Brothers Reid with the immediacy of the Brothers Kilgour. I'm not sure I'd be so reductive but even conceding the point, you'd have to admit that it does sound like a tasty recipe.
Also, Swedish people like them, and you know you need to be on the ground floor when that happens...
Crystal Stilts - "Converging in the Quiet"
The steady drumbeat that starts this track gains is given more power by a sparse set up that's all kick drum and no rattling cymbal. The vocals are far away, delivered in a dreamy accent that seems to come from a more world weary place than modern day Brooklyn. The winding guitar line that forms the song's spine is where that errant Clean comparison really rings true. I'm thinking inspired '82 stuff like "Fish" or "Point That Thing Somewhere Else." Good company.
Crystal Stilts - "Crippled Croon"
This one has a bit more spring in its step, though the regally detached voice could still coming from a chilling radio program, revealed to be emanating from beyond the grave in a Twilight Zone episode's final minutes. And none of this really suggests the spark that their very active, usually standing drummer brings to their live show.
For more exact details, like right now, go here. More to come on the full night in the next couple days. You won't have to look very hard for it, trust me.
Posted by Jeff Klingman at February 26, 2008 07:30 PM
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