Autumn leaves gathered in the gutters of Ste. Catherine street. October drawing closer toward its close and I walked from the Beudry metro exit toward Le National to witness one of this year's most anticipated shows, (for me at least). Ticket and stamp I made a passage through the still bodies as Atlas Sound had only just taken up their instruments. Good timing I suppose. Bradford Cox was unmistakable; tall and thin, someone I was with later likened him to a man-sized child, with his boyish haircut. Nonetheles he looked confident an acoustic guitar slinged on his shoulder, comfortable at the foot of the microphone, which was wired through a variety of pedals. The hype surrounding this young man seemed to shed itself as they strolled through the first song, it was no longer hype but verified talent. In between songs he carried himself in a self-depricating sort of humor not altogether unlike his muical hero S. Malkmus, charming the crowd quixotically, with oddball weirdness and embarrasing honesty. As an obnoxious front stage showgoer lifted his beer in praise, Cox passively mentioned that driking makes him nausious. At another point he told an aimless story about his experiences in Montreal that day, they involved a guitar pedal with the big dipper emblazoned in lights that lit up when activated, and a smoked meat restaurant that served him a stomach ache. His songs however indicated nothing short of prodigiousness, choruses rising dreamily out from densely layered textures of rhythm, too complex to describe on first listen. Turning skeptics into converts.
As I had expected many of the attended were here specifically for the opening act, I ran into a friend outside of the venue, as he was walking away I asked him with confusion: "You're not going to stay for Broadcast?" He seemed to shrug his shoulders and muttered some excuse about out of town friends. I wasn't altogether surprised. The halved Broadcast are a musical pair which require a great deal of patience from their audience, tonight would certainly prove to be no exception. From my seat in the balcony I watched the two figures, Trish typically wearing a minimalist white dress. They stood across the stage from one another, tables with devices spread before each of them, a screen there in the middle played the projections from a netherworldly universe. The set began with a dense twenty five minutes of ambient noise, sparse and nealy indetectable vocals, they seemed to be testing out this new incarnation of their sound, which I had already been privy to through recent downloading and interviews and other blog entries. Although nothing could have prepared me for the absolute tapestry of sounds that was hoisted over the innocent crowd, who were nearly hypnotized by the evolving circle images being thrust onto that projection screen.
That string of new songs broke off, then they tried to play "Corporeal" their tireless track off Tender Buttons. However a problem occured with the microphone that Trish was using and they stopped less than a third of the way through. Then a minute later they started the song again only to have the same microphone difficulties. After stopping, with the sound guy running back and forth across the stage, Trish said in her accent "Were gonna play Corporeal if it fucking kills us." On the third try they did, and they made it count. The screen between them was showing more concrete images if only slightly, the second half of their set including more accessible Broadcast material, songs like "Black Cat" and some others.
Since I had never seen an exclusively knob-centric show at Le National I was mildly suspicious of how things would carry out. But even with the ten minutes we spent waiting for them to fix the microphone, I can say on my behalf, that the sound was damn near impeccable (and I was only sitting in the balcony). As organisms and insects morph in the course of nature the Broadcast duo seemed to indicate a noteworthy change through the first part of their set. Though in listening to the new EP I cannot wholeheartedly believe this because it shares some songs from the latter half of their set, holding one undeniable element which easily appeases anyone Broadcast's dedicated listeners: the pure holliness of Trish's voice; soaring through the various throbbing noises like some kind of space siren.
