Friday April 6, 2007
viral:CULTURE
Columbia College
Hokin Annex
Chicago, IL
Aaron Dilloway
Dave Fischoff
Mark Solotroff
Last Friday's show had a pretty solid turnout for an early event. I liked the space that we played in, as the performance area suited my solo set-up, with the tall stacks of amps, the good lighting, etc. I started things off with a 14-minute (my longest solo show yet, I believe) microphone set. I let it build up slowly and then I kind of went for it hard for a few minutes, before "modulating" the feedback a bit more and slowly bringing the levels down. It took a short time for me to realize how loud it was actually getting. Some people mentioned that the frequencies were pretty painful. For my efforts, I managed to cut my forehead with a banged-up, somewhat jagged microphone, so I had blood running down over my left eye to add to the (spotlit) tension. Dave Fischoff went on next, and while his methodology fit into the overarching decision-making that brought all of us together, his appealing pop-oriented songs were a strange fit between Aaron and me. It might have been nice to hear him third, to kind of soften the mood a bit after the two of us. As it was, people who were there for noise started filtering out for a cigarette and/or beer break. Aaron was up next and after a brief struggle to get the sound guy to really crank things up, he blasted away into an amazing set that seemed to directly reference his BloodLust! 7-inch, which was really nice to hear. The set moved through distinct phases before winding up with a slow-motion, melodic synth pattern that I could have listened to for hours.
All in all, a weird but fun event. Thanks to Terence Hannum for asking me to participate. Thanks to Aaron and Roach for driving down. Thanks to all of our friends who came out to support us.
