Kansas City Music Blog

BY IAN HRABE

Right before Dirty Projectors went on, I overheard someone on the balcony talking about the Talking Heads concert film Stop Making Sense. Talking Heads come up a lot when people talk about Dirty Projectors, enough that now they are being heralded as the heir apparent to art pop. And with good reason, too.

Ian Hrabe

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Like Heads frontman David Byrne, Dave Longstreth works with complex song structures and experimental-leaning arrangements to craft what are essentially artsy pop songs. After toiling away for years and touting a discography featuring a "glitch opera" about Don Henley and a reworking of Black Flag's Damaged LP from memory, Longstreth has achieved his magnum opus with Dirty Projectors latest record, Bitte Orca, and brought almost all of those songs with him to the Granada last night.

One element of Dirty Projectors sound that makes them so unique is Longstreth's guitar work, and after watching him play I realized how he achieves this: He approaches the guitar like someone who has never seen one in use. He'd modified a right handed Stratocaster so it appeared as if he was playing the guitar upside down, which only added to the effect. On top of this, both of his hands looked like those of someone pretending to play the guitar. His fingers were all over the place, yet somehow every note fit perfectly, like in a John Coltrane sax solo.

Though Longstreth is the brains behind Dirty Projectors, he would be nowhere without his backing band. Most of the songs from Bitte Orca were played with absolute precision as a sextet, but the band were at their best when stripped down to a four piece made up of guitarist Amber Coffman, bassist/keyboardist Angel Deradoorian, and drummer Brian Mcomber.

With this line-up, they delivered the set's highlight, a blistering version of "Fucked For Life" from 2006's New Attitude EP. It was loose and came completely unhinged in one beautiful moment when the guitars and drums reached a massive crescendo that culminated with Coffman's long hair flailing, Deradoorian wailing on the keyboard, Mcomber almost knocking a cymbal loose and Longstreth jumping up and down in place.

Sadly, everything after that paled in comparison. While the music was incredibly complex and the players all did an amazing job, the sheen of perfection made the next few songs feel a little cold. This also made the flaws stick out in sharp contrast. The heartbreaking ballad "Two Doves," which featured only Longstreth on acoustic guitar and Deradoorian on vocals, suffered from a crummy sound mix took the wind out of the most beautiful song on Bitte Orca. Their single, "Stillness is the Move," also fell flat. The lead guitar riff that drives the recorded version was thin and drowned out, as were Amber Coffman's vocals, which sounded too quiet to make an impact. This was particularly sad, as Coffman was giving her all and putting on her best Beyonce dance moves to supplement the R&B groove of the song.

That said, they couldn't have picked a better set closer than "Useful Chamber," the best song from Bitte Orca. Where the few preceding songs felt a little stilted, the band came unhinged again for the epic "Bitte Orca! Orca Bitte!" chorus and earned the hype that touts them as one of the most exciting bands right now.

The encore featured the brand new track, "When the World Comes to an End," and their collaboration with David Byrne from the Dark Was the Night compilation, "Knotty Pine." This found Dave Longstreth putting on his best Byrne impression, which was spot on, although I guess it's not that surprising given that Longstreth is indebted to his influence.

The big difference between the two Daves, though, is sense of humor, and where Byrne's was present but never obtrusive, Longstreth came off as super serious and a little pretentious (he spent a minute telling the audience not to smoke even though no one was smoking as there is a smoking ban and while he acted sweet about it, it seemed very hoity toity).

Let's just say I don't see Longstreth donning a big suit anytime soon.

Set List
Cannibal Resource
Ascending Melody
Temecula Sunrise
No Intention
Fucked For Life
The Bride
Two Doves
Remade Horizon
Stillness is the Move
Useful Chamber

Encore
When the World Comes to an End
Knotty Pine

Openers Tune-Yards were a nice primer for Dirty Projectors. Merril Garbus is essentially a one-woman band and with the exception of a bassist, she does all of the instrumentation herself with the help of a loop pedal. Drums were looped with a mix of snare, floor tom and beatboxing, and she supplemented her oversized ukelele with fuzz and distortion pedals to give it an electric guitar sound when she wanted to rock out. Those songs tended to be more straightforward, yet were the highlights of her set.

A handful of songs featured a lot of screaming, a lot of chanting, and generally seemed like she was trying to make African tribal music, which was often awkward and a little embarrassing, though most of the time her voice took on a soulful quality, and she seemed less like a white African tribeswoman and more like a New Englander playing lovely and complex little pop songs.