Liars, Unknown Mortal Orchestra

July 28, 2012 • A&R Music Bar, Columbus, Ohio

I know, right? Going to a Liars show after I trashed WIXIW? (I didn't trash WIXIW, I gave it a 6, what are you talking about?) Anyway, I know a good time when I hear of it, and it's been a while since my last concert—too long. So to the A&R Music Bar I went, one of the stuffiest venues I've ever been to on one of the stuffiest days we've had yet. And, well, it was fun.

Unknown Mortal Orchestra

Never heard of them before, but they weren't bad. Some kind of psychedelic spacey groove rock thing, like T. Rex and Dinosaur Jr. making sweet reptilian love in orbit around the sun. Their music wasn't the most memorable, as they seem to have a really weird sense of melody resulting in songs that are very un-catchy; however their rhythm was bang-on most of the time, especially on the groovier tracks. I feel like their drummer is a lot better than he makes out to be and was holding back for the sake of their style. Anyway, not really my kind of thing, but not bad either.
5 • Most Bored-Looking Bassist Award

Liars

They say some bands are studio bands, and some are live bands. Liars is definitely a live band, as everything they played just sounded so much better and more interesting in concert. What is a quieter, more ambient track becomes a droning, pulsing wall of sound; a moderate rocker becomes a monstrosity of tribal drumming drenched in feedback and groaning synthesizers. It was also a heck of a lot more danceable, almost regardless of style, and the crowd took advantage of that. Most of Liars' set came from WIXIW, of course, with a handful of songs from Sisterworld and "Let's Not Wrestle Mt. Heart Attack" from Drum's Not Dead (and maybe "Drum and the Uncomfortable Can" too, I think? regardless I wasn't the only one really excited to hear something from that album). Anyway, it was definitely an awesome show and everyone had a great time even if some of the audience members were kind of douches. It happens. Absolutely worth seeing even if, like me, you didn't care much for their latest album.
8 • Loudest Show That I've Ever Seen Award

Ulver – Childhood's End

May 28, 2012 • Kscope

Either Ulver has transcended all of space-time or they've totally lost it; I'm not sure which. It seemed like they could do no wrong after releasing some of the greatest albums ever over the last nearly-twenty years or so, mastering everything from black metal to electronic to art rock to ambient. Since Wars of the Roses, though, they've been losing me. Childhood's End is an interesting new direction for the band but I don't know if I'm really feeling it.

For anyone who doesn't yet know, Childhood's End is a cover album; Ulver takes on various rock bands from the mid-'60s with a psychedelic pop feel. Given that neither '60s rock nor psych pop generally do much for me, it's hard for me to click with the music on this album. Garm's vocals are the only thing reminiscent of older Ulver—not that I wasn't expecting them to change their sound yet again, but the songs don't sound like Ulver songs in the same way you could tell that Wars of the Roses had Ulver songs (even if they weren't particularly good ones).

Not that Childhood's End is bad, though. Given the source material Ulver did quite a fine job crafting new sounds with it. Many tracks have a really nice ethereal quality to them—lots of reverb and background strings, of course—combined with a sort of folky aesthetic (comes with the '60s territory, I suppose). Sometimes it works and they pull out something really great (like "Where Is Yesterday" or "Can You Travel in the Dark Alone?"), but other songs are still a bit too silly or cheesy to warrant more than one listen ("Today" or "I Had Too Much to Dream Last Night", among others). Fortunately most of the songs are pretty short, so the bad ones are over soon enough, but I still feel like a lot of the dumber ones should have been trimmed easily.

Even after a few listens I'm still a bit confused by this album. Ulver completionists will of course listen to it, but be forewarned that it's not the same band that you grew to love back with Bergtatt or Perdition City. As an introduction to obscure '60s rock, sure, this might be a good place to start, but I couldn't care less. Dad rockers (yeah I went there) might like it for sentimental reasons, but what dad rocker is going to listen to Ulver in the first place, let alone enjoy their covers more than the originals? And that doesn't really leave us anywhere. Sure, it's a fine album. They did a good job. But why bother?

4