Decibel

I spent about eight hours at two Decibel events yesterday. Thomas Fehlmann's dub set was similarly exciting as Deadbeat's a couple weeks ago at Bumbershoot. It sounded like he had enough ideas to play all night, and he seemed delighted to be sharing them with us. Although I did like the experience of listening while seated in the Broadway Performance Hall, especially during the second half of his set I think the audience would really have appreciated a dancefloor. I need to check out some of his records.

At Neumo's I enjoyed bits of Telefon Tel Aviv but they were a little too melody-oriented for me. I did enjoy the live remix of Ciara's "1, 2 Step". Not that she was there, but that they performed it on their equipment rather than playing a record they'd made.

Apparat was really in control and probably played a great set (I'd guess he's used to playing for much longer) but his sound was a little too aggressive for me. It was definitely interesting but the bass was too punishing and all in all his sound was harder than what I really enjoy. Alex Smoke remedied that, making use of softer and more pleasurable beats and synth tones. I wish he'd have played first, but as it was a full day of work (including rearranging our office) and six hours of music wore me out by 2am, so I left before it was over.