The Youth and The Destroyer support Steely Heart, LOgO

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4104516285_57cba4f95f.jpgLast time I saw The Youth and the Destroyer, I commented that they maybe needed to be gigging more regularly and rehearsing more in order to improve. Well, they were in action again on Saturday night meaning two gigs in as many weeks. Introduced by bassist Reggie as "about the douchiest music you've ever heard", they played their way though half a dozen or so songs and even switched up their line-up for the last song, though it wasn't quite Candy Shop doing Ding Ding Dang. They might well have improved since the last time I saw them, but it was kind of hard to tell.

The headliners were Steely Heart, recommended by Dan Shapiro on The Beat (go here) and also by Morgan Short when I was at the Heart Attack night last Thursday. These guys know their stuff, so I went along to check them out. Steely Heart's lead singer has the swagger of Bian Yuan and the band have a sound that's similar to Casino Demon's - not surprising given the friendship between the three. Honestly, I didn't feel all that engaged by the band's performance. That's nothing against them necessarily (or those who recommended them) - they could have been amazing, but again it was kind of hard to tell.

Why? Because this gig was at LOgO. Anyone who's ever caught a band at LOgO knows that it's not the best place to see a gig and that the sound is far from the best. Although it's never been my favourite place to watch bands, I've never had a massive problem with it, but on Saturday night it seemed particularly bad, worse than usual. Maybe, having caught a couple of shows at MAO now with their fancy (i.e. good) soundsystem, it's made me realise just how bad the sound is at other venues, but at LOgO on Saturday it was really poor. Not everyone can invest in a state of the art system like MAO, but when it gets to the point that it damages the performances of the bands, it's time to do something about it. Or simply go elsewhere.

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3 Comments

Funny you should mention Casino Demon because I was kinda put off them by a similar situation. I went to their first YYT gig on Dan's suggestion and thought they were pretty good. Then as the CD was out they came down for another show but it was all over the place.

It was badly promoted and not many people came, the band were half a*sed and the CD was nowhere to be found. The whole night was summed up by the attitude of their manager. He had gone to a friend's house party to get drunk and never made it to the show. He had the CDs with him.

It's OK for underground shows to be kinda sketchy, or underground or DIY - but not half-a*sed or don't care.

The other story was the Candy Shop gig. I'm not even into that style of music too much - but the band work hard and genuinely care about their performance and their fans. The result: an amazing energetic and fun show with a good attendance and moshing/jumping/dancing.

Now on a personal and subjective level - I really wanted to see Fearless play with a good sound system. But I fell asleep again.

At least with Casino Demon you could hear the band though (except for Wahaha of course, after they were denied an encore), I couldn't even get a proper idea of Steely Heart's sound with this show. The trouble is, it may have damaged the band unduly. Maybe they suck and would have been bad with a decent soundsystem, but they might be pretty good and were just let down by poor sound - it was really too hard to tell.

I was really distracted by whatever eff-ed up Japo-horror flick they were playing during the performance. It neither added to nor detracted from the performance of Steely Heart; it simply existed in a world of its own, drawing you deeper and deeper into its dark world of sadistic, steadycam trauma (otherwise known as SST).

I'm sorry Steely Heart. I was utterly mesmerized, as if countless acupuncture needles were stuck in my frontal lobe.

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