All Time Top 100

Friday, January 25, 2008

Explosions in the Sky - Concorde 2

As honours bestowed from Indie Authority on high go, it doesn’t get better than being asked to curate one of ATP’s wildly successful Holiday Camp weekenders. This, coupled with the critical acclaim that met their 6th album, last years ‘All of a sudden I miss everybody’ and the fact they’re presently staring down the barrel of a world tour stretching well into June should give you some idea of the regard in which EITS are held.

It’s fair to say the Texan four piece don’t do subtle. Their sound is wholly instrumental and employs treated twinkling guitars, sweeping chord progressions, quiet/loud dynamics and washes of cavernous reverb to create what to these ears sounds like an overblown post-rock soundtrack to a Disney movie. Mogwai for your Mum, if you will.

Sound familiar? Well yes, there are plenty of bands out there working the same formula but few can compete with the majesty of EITS live. Whilst their records I find are all too frequently sterile and soulless affairs, their precision engineered live show and masterful musicianship was quite something to behold: Each instrument was distinct and purposeful, the material delivered with unerring conviction and concentration and the sound out the front glacial and pristine throughout.

Devoid of any audience interaction beyond a gushingly courteous intro, the show itself was clearly designed to be consumed as a whole. Individual tracks bled imperceptibly into each other, eliciting gasps of ‘Ooh’ and ‘Aaah’ from some quarters of the audience as if they were witness to the firework displays to which EITS sonically aspire. And though they painted from the same palette throughout it never became tiresome as musically there was much to enjoy. Each track developed like a mini symphony, crammed with diversions and explorative passages, its layers unfurling over time with increasing beauty and complexity like some exotic plant in bloom.

They wrapped up one of the latter tracks with some sensational choreography, the three guitarists to the front of the stage quite literally beating the life out of their instruments. As they limped offstage looking utterly drained both physically and mentally it seemed both rude and pointless to clamour for more: EITS it appeared, had already given us their all.

posted by: Jim Brackpool @ 4:05 PM

+ + +