Toronto post-rock band Do Make Say Think have long been described as “cinematic”, but lets face it – that’s just lazy music critic shorthand for “instrumental”. However, the sprawling collective have started to live up to that description more literally lately, by taking on the challenge of writing and performing live scores for silent movies.
Last summer, they collaborated with Owen Pallett and Berlin experimental electronic musician Robert Lippok to come up with a soundtrack to the 1919 German horror movie Tales Of The Uncanny as part of Luminato. Seems like they enjoyed the experience, because last week TIFF Bell Lightbox brought them in to provide music for a showing of Erich von Stroheim’s epic masterpiece, Greed.
Considering that they came up with the 2 hours of music in only a couple months, it’s especially impressive what they were able to do. The score spanned everything from twangy country-influenced motifs to dark experimental electronic music to impressions of Dixieland jazz, while still maintaining their band identity. Even diehard fans wouldn’t have guessed they were capable of such versatility.
You can get a taste of the experience from this video clip of the performance. Hopefully they’ll eventually decide to release a DVD of the entire night. If this kind of thing gets you excited, you may want to check out avant-garde turntablist DJ Spooky November 16 and 17, when he’ll be performing a score for Rebirth of a Nation.
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