Merry Swankster: the Juan MacLean / Chairlift, live @ the Bowery Ballroom, New York City, 10.17.08

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November 03, 2008

the Juan MacLean / Chairlift, live @ the Bowery Ballroom, New York City, 10.17.08

A week of post-CMJ shellshock kept this write up on the shelf, but couldn't bring myself to let it slide entirely. It was a better show than anything I'd see in the nominally more fertile schedules of the week that followed. One of DFA Records' original powerhouses, the Juan MacLean have been churning out steady-thumping, yet classily minimal, dance music for the better part of the decade. This was a bit of a whim attendance, but a shrewd one in retrospect.

First though, a note on their shotgun wedding opener, the suddenly successful Chairlift...

Chairlift

It's frankly kind of weird that I'd not seen Chairlift play. As Colorado to Brooklyn transplants, they cover two geographical poles of MS' coverage. They've been bobbing around in my own little small pond for quite a while, I mean, they played After the Jump's summer fest. back in June, and I even missed them there. Kind of lame that I only get around to discussing them in earnest now that they're soundtracking iPod commercials. But it did give me a chance to form a belated first impression from the band's show. And this might seem painfully obvious now, in the shallow light of conventional wisdom, but I was surprised at how big they sounded. Singer Caroline Polachek, especially, has a sweet, strong voice that comes already made up for the narrow spotlight they've been given. The thing is, that, right this second, the glare is focused on a small stylistic sliver from what is a pretty muddled act. Bouncy new wave fluff like the pod-selling "Bruises" and "Evident Utensil" were light, airy, and flatly charming. They're like bite size Milky Ways. With the song length stretched out, and the hooks less immediate, my attention waned. But still, to her credit, Caroline's voice filled a Bowery-sized room even during the ponderous tracks, ambling forth without clear destination in mind. They'll stick around for a bit, I'd guess.

the Juan MacLean

Perhaps it was a common trend around the end of last decade, or perhaps it was a peculiarity of geography and demographics (not to mention pharmacology), but I attended college in the midst of a fairly wide dabbling in European club music. But, much like the effect of Puffy's anemic rap skills bleeding through my thin walls, Paul Oakenfold's lame trance stylings were a poor ambassador for a huge genre at large. But more than an aversion to faceless repetitions, it was very tough to shed teen rockist suspicions about what exactly those DJ types were even doing behind their expensive consoles. Hey guys, get hype, I'm gonna raise my hands in the air now, cause I just put on another record!! But that's not nearly the method of the JM. As an expansive instrumental set up foretold, we were damn well going to feel the music ahead of us, and be close enough to study its clockwork guts.

John MacLean, also known as the Juan MacLean of THE Juan MacLean, entered smirking to the emotive cheese of Tears for Fears' "Head Over Heels," which could have been an ominous sign for the sincerity of the performance to come. But even at the shows most lactose infused moments, when coaxing butter fat funk from his mounted theremin (the funkiest theremin mine ears doth heard), there was a joyous wizard quality to MacLean. Presto! I shall conjure laser squiggles from the very air itself! His band had come to level us with precision, but there was a joie de vivre in the room that couldn't have been entirely pill enhanced. The very expensive looking laser light show that filled every cubic inch of the stage and its musicians was helpful in that regard, as well.

The single biggest factor in the band's accelerated palatability is the solidified participation of vocalist Nancy Whang. You might best remember her as Lady Deadpan from the last LCD Soundsystem record, mocking you and your ability to normalize. though sparingly used in that band, Whang's singing was spread liberally around new material from the '09 release The Future Will Come. Less Than Human was the band's previous mantra, but as usual, it's tough to overestimate how much a dose of humanity aids the beats' actual connection. She didn't wow us with virtuoso three part harmonies or anything, but she was the performances' heart--a small woman, threatening to be lost in a rising tide of rhythm at any moment, but welcoming its rush. Without extensive familiarity with the band's set (I have their last DFA record, dusty, on my shelf somewhere and I've really liked newer material that's trickled out) she was my emotional rope line, at least.

After bringing the set to a fitting climix with a taut, still dripping from squat thrusts, version of previous club hit, "Give Me Every Little Thing" the JM launched into the truly, truly epic "Happy House." In regard to the song's influences, I have to admit that I only know what I've read. My house-music exposure was later and much less life affirming than the Latin piano tinged late 80s variety that's supposedly being referenced here. A great 13 minutes on vinyl, the song must have ballooned even longer as this show's set closer. It contained multitudes. Nancy fulfilled her star turn admirably, rocking back and forth to proclaim her lover "so damn excellent," as John floated his lascivious hum. But it really got intense after she exhorted him to "launch me into space." It got more cosmic, weirder, faster, in turn. By my count, the main refrain receded and returned in full force no less than three times--encore teases contained within the final act itself. Of course the blissed out crowd was worked into a fearful froth each time. As it came to a final close, my head was spinning ready for more, but my feet were resentful ready to stop. A live dance music show can have no better epitaph, right?

the Juan MacLean - "Happy House"