Reviews

Combichrist Tour: 

@ The Palladium - Upstairs [Worcester, MA (USA)]

Unsound Festival New York 2011: 

@ Abrons Arts Center [New York City, NY (USA)]

Millipede Show: 

@ Darkroom [Chicago, IL (USA)]

Combichrist Tour: 

@ Webster Theater [Hartford, CT (USA)]

The Swans Tour: 

@ The Middle Cafe - Downstairs [Cambridge, MA (USA)]

Tragedy For Us Tour: 

@ Champions Cafe [Everett, MA (USA)]

Steel Hook Prostheses Tour: 

@ Club Choices [Somerville, MA (USA)]

Wave-Gotik Treffen 2010 - Day 4 [Leipzig, Saxony (Germany)]

Wave-Gotik Treffen 2010 - Day 4: 

@ Volkspalast: Kuppelhalle [Leipzig, Saxony (Germany)]

Wave-Gotik Treffen 2010 - Day 4: 

@ Volkspalast: Kuppelhalle [Leipzig, Saxony (Germany)]

Wave-Gotik Treffen 2010 - Day 4: 

@ Volkspalast: Kuppelhalle [Leipzig, Saxony (Germany)]

Wave-Gotik Treffen 2010 - Day 4: 

@ Volkspalast: Kuppelhalle [Leipzig, Saxony (Germany)]

Wave-Gotik Treffen 2010 - Day 3 [Leipzig, Saxony (Germany)]

Wave-Gotik Treffen 2010 - Day 3: 

@ Werk II [Leipzig, Saxony (Germany)]

Wave-Gotik Treffen 2010 - Day 3: 

@ Werk II [Leipzig, Saxony (Germany)]

Wave-Gotik Treffen 2010 - Day 3: 

@ Werk II [Leipzig, Saxony (Germany)]

Wave-Gotik Treffen 2010 - Day 3: 

@ Schauspielhaus [Leipzig, Saxony (Germany)]

I wasn't planning to see Seventh Harmonic, but I needed to make sure I was early enough to have a good seat for Arcana. The good news, I had third row center seats the entire night; the bad news, I had to sit through the only truly awful performance I saw this festival. Part of this was due to technical difficulties, but the rest were because the band didn't seem ready for the spotlight. This surprised me as the singer is also one of the singers for Arcana.

The live band consisted of three women and a laptop. When they began, the music wasn't too bad; however, when the singing began, I could only cringe in response to the clash between the voice and all other music.

A laptop was set up to play several melodies and harmonies. The percussionist handled a timpani, chimes, and several other instruments. She was very good, but looked like she was either bored or trying to concentrate really hard. It was probably the latter as my fiancée overheard them talking later about how the percussion monitors were too low and yelling at the person doing sound didn't fix the problem. At one point, the bassist took over so she could play a small drum, probably a doumbek. Maybe I would have been able to see what it was if I sat on the far side of stage left. She sat behind the chimes where most people could not see her.

The bassist was on the opposite side of the stage from the percussionist for most of the show. Her performance as a bassist and percussionist was excellent. She had catchy basslines and even took out a bow to play the bass.

The singer was front and center with a music stand obscuring her for most of the show. I do not object to bands having music stands to hold instruments or even have lyrics as an occasional reminder, but she needed to look at the lyrics while she was singing for most of the songs. I found this to be totally unacceptable and unprofessional. My earlier complaint about her singing doesn't stem from her inability to sing. She, Ann-Mari Thim, is fantastic with Arcana and their music, but singing in an operatic voice for the kind neoclassical music Seventh Harmonic creates sounds totally wrong to my ears. Their music needs to be way more epic (see Arcana) for her singing style to work.

At the end of the third or fourth song, Ann-Mari said, "we don't often get to practice together..." You know what? The laptop did not care. It was programmed to have a certain amount of silence between tracks. It wasn't going to stop because someone wanted to delay the start of the song. It drowned her out. She tried repeating her sentence, but it mostly went unheard over the music. I really felt that these precious seconds summed up their performance.

[Close Review]

Wave-Gotik Treffen 2010 - Day 3: 

@ Schauspielhaus [Leipzig, Saxony (Germany)]

Wave-Gotik Treffen 2010 - Day 3: 

@ Schauspielhaus [Leipzig, Saxony (Germany)]

Wave-Gotik Treffen 2010 - Day 2 [Leipzig, Saxony (Germany)]

Wave-Gotik Treffen 2010 - Day 2: 

@ Volkspalast: Kuppelhalle [Leipzig, Saxony (Germany)]

Wave-Gotik Treffen 2010 - Day 2: 

@ Volkspalast: Kantine [Leipzig, Saxony (Germany)]

Wave-Gotik Treffen 2010 - Day 2: 

@ Volkspalast: Kuppelhalle [Leipzig, Saxony (Germany)]

Wave-Gotik Treffen 2010 - Day 2: 

@ Kohlrabizirkus [Leipzig, Saxony (Germany)]

Wave-Gotik Treffen 2010 - Day 1 [Leipzig, Saxony (Germany)]

Wave-Gotik Treffen 2010 - Day 1: 

@ Agra Hall [Leipzig, Saxony (Germany)]

Wave-Gotik Treffen 2010 - Day 1: 

@ Agra Hall [Leipzig, Saxony (Germany)]

Kinetik Festival 2010 - Phase 5: 

@ Usine C [Montreal, Quebec (Canada)]

Kinetik Festival 2010 - Phase 4: 

@ Usine C [Montreal, Quebec (Canada)]

Kinetik Festival 2010 - Phase 3: 

@ Usine C [Montreal, Quebec (Canada)]

Kinetik Festival 2010 - Phase 2: 

@ Usine C [Montreal, Quebec (Canada)]