Preview addition: Civil Civic

Dear friends of The Craze. If you are a regular follower, you will know my undying love for Civil Civic. Well, I found out yesterday (!) that they are playing Urban Spree this Thursday (!!). Read my review from last time they hit Berlin at Kantine and meet me at Urban Spree on Thursday. Bring your best friend and your best dance moves!

Review: Wolf Eyes + Bill Kouligas

Last years Wolf Eyes show at Festsaal Kreuzberg was so good that I just wanted to see them again at Urban Spree this Monday. Not much changed concerning the band, there is no new record and I didn't hear of any plans to release one in the near future, but the show itself still felt different. Probably even better than the last one.

When we arrived at Urban Spree, Bill Kouligas was already playing a DJ set outside of the venue. I really liked the concept of having somebody play music outside before everyone was about to squeeze themselves into a dark, hot and sticky room for over an hour. Kouligas played a really cool set, mostly consisting of older dub tunes. I really liked it and the music was perfectly for hanging out outside.

At some point however it just got a little cold, so we decided to go inside where Wolf Eyes also were about to start playing. The room was just dimly lit and completely filled with fog, which created a nice creepy atmosphere that was a perfect fit for the upcoming music. Wolf Eyes started to play and I immediately liked it. Their set was mostly built on minimalistic and monotonous beats with the additions of noisy layers and heavily distorted and processed guitar. The gnarly and nagging vocals did their part to complete Wolf Eyes' harsh industrial sound. While their show last year mainly had consisted of songs from their last record, I had the feeling that improvised parts and more free structures played a huge part in this night's set. The sound was great, a point where Urban Spree never seems to disappoint. There also was an uncomfortable  light show with strobe lights flashing and moving around, that somehow suited the music but was a bit hard to look at most of the time. Wolf Eyes stage presence was definitely more engaging, probably due to the fact that Urban Spree's stage is lower and the whole setting is much more intimate than it used to be in the rather large Festsaal. The combination of the dreary, dark music with their Mad Max like dystopic appearance was really intense and impressive.

All in all this simply was a great show. It definitely wasn't unchallenging but I knew before that it wasn't going to be since Wolf Eyes is a band that challenges the listening habits of their audience. They're a band that transcend limits of genres and anticipation. Their sound is offensive but in the end I definitely prefer a band that's offensive and arduous to one that's just boring and complaisant.

Competition: Low Roar + Bled White at Urban Spree

If you're looking for something to do next Monday, look no further: We're giving away a guest list spot +1 for the Low Roar + Bled White show at Urban Spree!

Low Roar plays music that consists of cinematic, melancholic and ghostly soundscapes. It's beautiful and warm electro-pop with roots in singer songwriter spheres that perfectly fits a Monday night in the Urban Spree surroundings.

All you have to do to win is send us an e-mail to win@thecraze.de until Sunday (9th) and tell us why you should be on the list that night.

Here's the facebook event for more info.

Review: Femminielli Noir + Jaako Eino Kalevi + Touchy Mob (5 Years Shameless/Limitless)

The 5th anniversary of Shameless/Limitless, which was also their last event before the winter hiatus, attracted a considerable amount of people at Urban Spree the weekend before.

The celebrations began with the performance of Femminielli Noir, a collaborative project of Jesse Osborne-Lanthier and Bernardino Femminielli. As the name could suggest, the whole thing is pretty dark, indeed. Heavy techno beats, some ambient sounds, distortions, on top of which resonate Femminielli's demonic screams/whispers and melo-recitations in Italian. He looks kind of Lucifer-ish too, so along with the beat-synchronised strobelights it was quite a show. A disco inferno, if you will.

Jaakko Eino Kalevi played the second gig of the evening and what an excellent gig that was. Somehow I haven't listened to this really talented and prolific Finnish guy before, so I was happy to discover his music from a fresh perspective. I even moved really close to the stage where it seemed that the fun was in full mode for everyone, the 'randoms' included: there was a group of people in the first row who clearly got there by accident (or maybe not, who knows these days) and one of the guys was using the music as a background he could rap to (really loud and in German), which sounded kind of interesting in an absurd, what-the-hell is happening way. However, that was just a temporary distraction, Kalevi's dreamy, chilled out sounds from another dimension as well as John Maus-resembling vocals quickly guided me back into the blissful mood.

Touchy Mob played last and it was quite late in the night, so I was probably already too tired to appreciate it. But people seemed to love it, the crowd was even denser than before and everyone was moving along to the beats.

Between the gigs you could go downstairs and dance to some tunes dj'ed by Molly Nilsson, among others. The room where it was happening was smaller than most of the living rooms you can find in Berlin and the songs that they were playing were a peculiar mixture of classic, cheesy and weird. All in all, super-fun houseparty vibes for everyone to enjoy and dance that Friday night away.

Late review: No Joy + Doom Squad + Secret Secret Girl

At the end of November there was a chance to check out a small showcase of bands hailing from the land of maple syrup and moose (all of the bands being based or having some connection to Montreal, to be precise), presented by Shameless/Limitless.

Doom Squad were first on the line-up. This band formed by three siblings proved that witch house did not end with Salem's last release and might still serve as an aesthetic foothold for those whose interests lay in the occult as well as electronic music. Compared to the crowd of copycats that emerged from this micro-genre, these guys seem to stand out. Instead of looking jaded or too-cool-for-this on stage, they genuinely seemed to be having fun right then and there, engaging in some kind of a personal ritual. The girls were dressed up in long, black dresses, yet somehow they looked more cute than goth, doing synchronised dances when they weren't busy playing different kinds of electronic and accoustic instruments. The parts most to my taste where when the guy got to sing and make sounds with his guitar, it added some reverb-y, post-punk feel to the tribal repetetiveness.

Next, there was Secret Secret Girl, which turned out to be two guys, both in disguise. One masked individual was operating the electronics while the frontman singed his heart out from behind a piece of cloth which covered his face. Motioning on stage like a true diva, he incited some dancing and a lot of curiosity in the audience. 

Just as the venue got a bit more crowded, No Joy started their set with a blast, creating a wall of sound like proper shoegazers should. It was super-loud and noisy which always creates a challenge for the PA, but it didn't sound painful, so I can't complain. If you had a chance to see My Bloody Valentine this summer, you know how vocals purposefully melt into the background and sometimes become even barely hearable when this type of music is performed live. Here, they became even more of a ghostly presence than on the records, harmonizing somewhere in the effects and feedback-heavy complexity of the work done by the guitars. Along with the punk-y sounding rhythm section, the whole band managed to create a coherent, organic whole from the set which incorporated different songs from its timeline. They rocked quite hard and it was fun to see those 2 girls being pros at what they do. 

Review: Esmerine

Until this show got announced, I've never listened to a single Esmerine song, nor was I even aware of their existence. Nonetheless this show was a pretty positive surprise!

In contrast to every show I saw at Urban Spree till now, this one started pretty early and actually took place in the (not so warm) gallery rather than in the main concert room. The setting was cozy, there was no stage and they had put up benches to sit on - something I strongly support, especially considering the music that was about to happen.

Esmerine are a Canadian band from the Godspeed You! Black Emperor/A Silver Mt. Zion surrounding. Because I like both of these bands, I was curious about how Esmerine would turn out to be live. Their style is often described as modern chamber music and when I took a look at the stage the first thing I noticed was the lack of guitars and the presence of some "unusual" instruments: a large stage xylophone, some oriental looking string-instruments, several percussion instruments and a small horn. The concert began with a brief introduction and started out very post rock sounding with the xylophone player stroking the bars with a bow and the cellist and contrabass player joining in. In the beginning this sounded not too different to other post-rock bands. There were spheric sounds and song structures that built up on another, letting everything sound very melodic.

Yet that changed significantly when more percussive elements joined in. Esmerine were on tour with a guest musician with whom they also wrote and recorded their last record Dalmak together in Istanbul. That setting obviously had a great impact on their music. The additional member played a variety of traditional turkish percussion instruments and his style of playing strongly influenced the mood and feel of the whole music. While there still were obvious aspects of "Western" classical and chamber music (also represented by what instruments they used) and while you could not deny the post-rock background of at least some of the band's members, their songs now got way more rhythmic and Oriental sounding. They mostly played songs from that last record and I really liked how these worked live. The mixture of these different sound elements and unusual instruments and the blending of "Western" and "Eastern" influences created a very special mood and feeling that made this band stand out from any of their probably better-known earlier bands. 

Towards the end of the set, Esmerine threw in a couple of older songs, mostly performed without the additional percussions. They announced a last song after which the audience applauded wildly, making the band come back twice to play an encore. The show ended with a song on a more or less out-of-tune piano and although I wasn't that thrilled anymore by the older songs, this was a pretty nice live experience.

Competition: Damo Suzuki with Sound Carriers

Damo Suzuki is probably best known for being the singer/vocalist for Can, one of the Krautrock pioneer bands and still a strong influence for many contemporary bands and artists. He still performs live, often inviting local guest musicians - the then so called "Sound Carriers"- to accompany him. For this show next Saturday (Dec 14th) at Urban Spree, members of Kadavar, In Zaire and Dead Skeletons will play with Suzuki and the coolest thing about it:

We are giving away two +1 guest list spots for this show! All you have to do to win is send us an e-mail to win@thecraze.de until Friday (Dec 13th) 6pm and tell us: What's your favorite canned food?

Have a look at the Urban Spree website for more info and details about the show and if you're in the mood and have an hour to spare, there's a link to a documentary film about Damo Suzuki below!

Competition: No Joy + Doom Squad + Secret Secret Girl

An exciting little gig is happening at Urban Spree this coming Thursday, 28 Nov.: A Canadian triple bill extravanganza.

If you want to go to the fuzzy indie guitar starlets' gig at Urban Spree, send us your suggestions for the most miserable song to win at thecraze dot de. Do this by 6pm Wednesday, 27 November and you plus your chosen loved one can just say "guest list please". If you need more info on the wonderful No Joy, watch out for our preview later this weekend.

Quick, late review: Orchestra of Spheres

It didn't take long for the Orchestra of Spheres to turn Urban Spree into a trippy, tribal, space-rock discotheque.
It is always nice to see a band putting an effort and making something a little bit more spectacular out of a live performance. Here, the music seemed to be as important as the visual aspect. All of the members of the New Zealand ensemble were dressed up in wacky, futuristic costumes (my favourite item was a hat made entirely out of cassette tapes).
I guess Sun Ra would have approved.

You will have a chance to see them again soon as they will be supporting Wooden Shjips at Panorama Bar on the 3rd of December.

Late summer reviews: Otto von Schirach + DAT Politics, King Khan & BBQ, Berlin Festival

Church of Phonk @ Berlin Festival

Summer came and went at the blink of an eye. And we were busy. C* and Gary got hitched in Vegas (no kiddin'), J. and C* got stuck into their new jobs, the weather was so great that most afternoons were spent by one of Berlin's beautiful lakes. When autumn came with full force last month, I really started fretting. Would I be able to handle another Berlin winter after the last one snowed its way into April? Now that relatives are calling about Christmas plans and the buttons need to be fastened again on my winter coats, the prospect of the impending cold does not seem quite as scary anymore. But it does let me dwell on great a summer we have had.

MBV @ Berlin Festival

This leads me to admit that most of summer I slacked terribly with my reviews. On one of our tea afternoons the other day, J. and I wondered whether it was still worth doing those old reviews and came to the conclusion that it was probably too late and it was best to leave it be. Who wants to live in the past, right? The future is now!

As a mark of respect to the many great performers I saw over the summer and to make sure I have links for my Top of the Year list next month, I am giving three past events a quick mention here, with a couple of photos to lighten the autumn blues. A hommage to summer.

PS: Also watch out for my Destruction Unit review and my second LA report later this week. And some point, there will also be an account of what happened when Iceage played West Germany.

Review: Black Pus + NMO

I hadn't added anything to my "potential concerts of the year" list in a while but this recent night featuring Black Pus and NMO at Urban Spree is now definitely on it...

This was one of those nights: A show I wanted to see taking place but at the same time having to struggle with the urge to just stay at home, considering all the stuff I would have to do the next day. Reading that the show was supposed to start at 11 didn't really help with that at first but once I had watched some videos of recent Black Pus shows on youtube (watch them here), I knew that not going out that night would be a thing I'd definitely regret afterwards.

photo by James Welburn

So I arrived at Urban Spree, where a rather annoyingly loud DJ set was still going on before NMO, the first act of the evening, who started their show in the middle of the crowd. They are a two-piece, consisting of the former drummer from MoHa! on a snare drum and some electronics plus another musician using some strange computer program to do... well, I have no idea to do what exactly. I also don't really care because what they did sounded pretty interesting nevertheless. Their set seemed like a live experimentation on drum sounds and rhythms and they combined rhythmic drum patterns with processed and sequenced parts and effects. At times it sounded like a crazy marching band walking through an experimental electronic music club. Not playing real songs but rather abstracts and motifs that followed and built up on each other, they managed to keep the whole set really interesting and exciting. They also fitted perfectly to what was supposed to happen next, both acts playing experimental drum based music but taking totally different approaches to it. My trek out this evening was definitely already worthwhile.

Review: Nisennenmondai and Clean & Jerk

After an exhausting day of taking care of stuff and having to repair my bike tire literally the last minute before heading to Urban Spree for the very first time, I was more than glad to have made it there against all odds. Nisennenmondai as well as Clean & Jerk were both fantastic!

Besides the fact of it being located somewhere on the RAW area, I didn't know anything about Urban Spree beforehands. On their website they proclaim to be an "independent contemporary art gallery"and to defend "an artistic grassroots approach, directed towards cities, street & graffiti artists, photographers and contemporary artists." That doesn't sound too bad in the first place and the venue also seemed nice at first sight. I arrived quite late but fortunately didn't miss anything, Clean & Jerk just started a couple of minutes after my arrival, so I made my way into the concert room on time together with a respectable amount of other people.

Since the front of the room was already quite packed, I just headed to the back and found a neat place on some high stairs with perfect view of the stage. Not only was the view pretty nice, I also instantly noticed the perfect sound, which contributed greatly to make this a worthwhile event. Clean & Jerk were announced as a new Berlin based project of an ex-Chrome Hoof member and I have to say they were more than a worthy support for Nisennenmondai. Their music wasn't completely different to Nisennenmondai's, both three piece bands played instrumental and highly rhythmic music with influences from Krautrock and Electronica. But still they had a very distinguished way of combining these influences to form something interesting and appealing. They're music was mainly relying on a dry and deep bass and tight drumming, completed by a percussionist who threw in some tribal rhythms, cowbells as well as synthesizer and keyboard melodies once in a while. This combination of rhythmic and minimalistic bass and drum playing immediately drew my attention and I was positively surprised to say the least. Musically it reminded me of early post-punk bands like Liquid Liquid, sometimes ESG or even Gang of Four combined with very reduced Electronica and early analog-synth music. The music was groovy (although I hate to use that word for some reasons) and driving, it was diversified but minimalistic at the same time and it made me wish to see these guys again some time soon. Perfect prelude to a great evening.