..And You Will Know Us By the Trail of Dead, Dance Disaster Movement

I walked up the stairs of the Bossanova and into a wall of soundseeming to originate from the stage, but only two people werestanding there and neither seemed to be playing an instrument.After wading through a sparse collection of teenagers in hoodies, Inoticed Dance Disaster Movement’s pedal collection. I’ve definitelyseen worse – guitar players who more closely resemble tap dancers -but DDM still had a platter of samplers, explaining the duo’sability to produce such a thunderous welcoming. I watched thedrummer swaying, and waited for the moment when he would start abeat and end the monotony – his body rocked like a zombie’s and hisshirt seemed stained from dinner (human brains?). Finally, thenoise stopped and the songs started, but that’s not to say thesongs weren’t noisy. Inbetween playing and sampling his guitar andvintage synths, the leader of the band shouted and sang atonallyyet rhythmically into the microphone, winning over the heads andfeet of his audience. At one point, he jumped from the stage andran circles around the crowd like a rabid monkey while banging potlids together above his head. I must say, it looked like a lot offun and he was clearly enjoying himself. If comparisons must bemade I would compare them to Suicide, but they clearly had adifferent energy, more like Nation of Ulysses. I would be extremelypleased to see them again in the right setting, say someone’sbasement where their energy would be more direct and the chance ofbleeding (probably from my ears) would be higher.

Before Trail of Dead blessed us with their presence, a cantatanot unlike Carmina Burana blasted through the house system and setthe tone for what everyone was hoping would be an epic show. Themusic faded and their set began with the simultaneous rhythm of thedual drummers – something that I still find interesting even thoughit’s becoming increasingly common. The moments when they both rodethe cymbals were deafening, though, and made it impossible to hearmuch of anything else. I started to notice that between every songthe guitars were traded out and, sure enough, not a song went bywithout this happening. My favorite part of the show was when thesometimes-drummer sang and totally went hyper-hypo. He worked thecrowd like a motivational speaker and seemed to be saying “You willmake a million dollars while working from home” although the truelyrics were probably much different. I felt a little bit of therock star attitude coming from these guys, which was reinforcedwhen the double guitar was brought on stage and playedun-ironically. Who do they think they are, Yngwie Malmsteen? Thecrowd didn’t flinch, though, and perhaps enjoyed the wankery of thenew songs, which are defiantly extended and proggish.

After the show I was happy to head to a house party, where notonly did the bands not switch guitars between songs, but didn’tplay guitars at all.