It was completely unintentional, but it turned out that every act we caught on Friday was fronted by a woman.
However, other than gender, there wasn’t much connecting the various showcases musically – everything from dance music to punk to lo-fi avant-folk was represented over the night.
We started out the at the Musee d’Art Contemporain de Montreal, where tUnE-YaRdS (aka Merrill Garbus and friends) were performing.
The night before we’d caught Garbus playing with Sister Suvi (supposedly their last show ever), and mistakenly assumed that they were calling it quits because of her band mate Patrick Gregoire’s obligations with Islands – after seeing tUnE-YaRdS it’s clear that Garbus’ solo project is just as likely a reason to put Sister Suvi on hold. It was a completely magical and mesmerising performance, and way more powerful than the lo-fi recorded work suggested. Mainly it’s just her, a ukulele, a looping pedal, a few drums, and her arresting voice.
For the live show, she augmented the one-woman-band format with horns, additional percussion, backup vocals, and bass guitar, but the core of the songs are still generated by her. Not the easiest music to describe – there are elements of lo-fi indie folk, but also avant-garde jazz, soul, hip-hop, and African pop. Easily one of the best live shows we’ve seen over the last year, and so far the highlight of our Pop Montreal experience.
Still riding the buzz from tUnE-YaRdS, we trekked over to Le National, where AIDS Wolf were doing their best to make the audience’s ears bleed. Unfortunately, Chloe Lum’s tendency of leaving the stage to perform on the floor doesn’t work so well in a big venue like this, as only a tiny fraction of the crowd could see her, which forces us to stare the rest of the band (who aren’t nearly as interesting watch).
Up next were Montreal synth-punk band Duchess Says, who had a much better grasp of how to work a big stage. Vocalist Annie-C might not be able to carry a tune to save her life (which isn’t really the point of this music anyway), but she’s definitely interesting to watch as she twists her body into odd interpretative dances, walks on the crowd’s hands, spits beer everywhere, and generally behaves like a deranged maniac.
Headlining this triple bill was Teenage Jesus & the Jerks, fronted by no-wave legend Lydia Lunch. In many ways Lunch is the musical grandmother of the opening acts, and she can still deliver obnoxious skronky noise rock with the best of them. She isn’t, however, nearly as physical of a performer, and was pretty much married to her mic stand for her whole set. Her darkly witty stage patter was possibly more interesting than the actual music.
After that much screaming, it was time for some funkier flavours, so we walked over the Studio Just For Laughs, where the Italians Do It Better crew were hosting a night of revisionist Italo-disco.
Up first were Desire IDIB’s newest discovery. Fronted by Montreal’s Megan Louise, they’re kind of like the French Canadian version of Glass Candy, except instead of mining Italo, they sound more like 80s Quebecois synth-fuelled roller-disco. They’re much more overtly pop, and with that comes a certain amount of cheese, but that’s not necessarily a problem.
Following Desire were the main attraction, Glass Candy themselves. Vocalist Ida No isn’t nearly as melodic a vocalist as Megan Louise, but she does have great stage presence and an undeniable coolness.
After watching this band evolve over the years, it’s clear that they’re at the top of their game right now.[rssbreak]
Read a recap of Thursday night at Pop Montreal here.
