The Deadly Syndrome
First thing The Deadly Syndrome did after plugging in was set up a bunch of white cardboard cutouts around the stage, leaning against the drums or hanging out on top of the amps or snuggling up with the mic stand. What they were is anyone’s guess, they looked like spooky versions of Gloop from the Herculoids, or ghosts out of Boo Berry. Each had a different facial expression, or a tie, or a moustache. At one point the singer grabbed one and swung it around, singing with it in his hands as if to say “Look what you’ve done!”
Gloops aside, the pure driving of these LA-based rockers is something to behold. It’s a crazy furor that goes up instead of out, like a whirlwind. The energy is irresistible and infectious, especially in a dark, sweaty cavern like the basement of the Delancey. At one point the guitarist took his shirt off.
“He took his shirt off,” said the keyboardist. “It’s freaking me out. This isn’t Linkin Park.”
The Syndrome also brought out a fuckload of photographers, who took over the entire first mass of people. At one point we counted ten professional photo-takers, probably increased by a circling Flight of the Conchords secret show rumor. You know things are out of hand when a photographer, not a fan, jumps on stage.
Then, at the end of their set, what did The Deadly Syndrome do? A full stage bow, hands clasped and everything! But no, the audience wants more. They hastily reform and attempt another.
“This song is going to sound different from how we usually play because we don’t have an acoustic or an accordion,” he says.
The drummer goes to the keyboard and stands it up, to act as accordion.
–David deLeon
Black Ghosts
Newly formed electro outfit the Black Ghosts, composed of the DJ from Wiseguys (remember them?) and the singer from Simian Mobile Disco DJ. But they're singing over the DJed beats. And the tracks they're spinning are consistently solid breaks and electro, but rarely recognizable, aside from some kind of heavy breakbeat-infused reworking of Justice's “Phantom”. Their own remix, perhaps? Either way, a formidable set, and I don't even like straight-up DJ sets all that often.
–Nate Dorr
Connan and the Mocassins
Cutesy, tiny Connan and his Moccasins (or, one of his Moccasins, he confessed that this was his first time playing live with the current bassist) would be easy to peg as a novelty if he weren’t so damn talented. Singing weird little songs about animals was never so odd – the songs are funny but don’t need to be funny, cute but in a weird way serious – and his sometimes-bluesy sometimes rock guitar is actually very good. He’s gimmicky without quite being a gimmick.
Something like “Sneaky Sneaky Dogfriend”, a YouTube favorite, is even more fun live, and “Egon”, and a song about a unicorn (“who’s standing on my uniform”) that somehow becomes the story of a minibison which only comes up to your knees. Uh, yeah.
Also, he hails from New Zealand. The Delancey show was his first appearance in the States, with a follow-up on Thursday at the Puck building. And even though it was 2am on a Tuesday, and some of us had been continuously rocking for twelve fucking hours, the audience formed a little semicircle around the stage, mesmerized by this hobbitish man and his high-pitched-on-purpose voice and his rhyming tunes. The vast majority of them had never heard of him before, and yet, when he wrapped up his set with “Michiki”, they cheered and chanted “One more song!”
“But those are the only songs he knows,” said Connan, referring to the new bassist, who’d only practiced the bare minimum for this five-song set. “Well, we could play an old David Bowie cover…” he mused.
Followed was a nearly-impromptu cover of the early-as-hell Bowie tune “Let me sleep beside you”, with Connan not knowing all the words and the bassist knowing none of the music. And yet, best 2:30am ever. Hopefully he’ll play some more shows in New York soon, at less ungodly hours.
–David deLeon
