the kniφe - shaking the habitual

They obviously wouldn't choose the London show, but I'm kind of interested to see it!

I don't care what kind of radical semiotics or whatever the group is invoking or aiming for, the show last night was one of the dumbest, most embarrassing things I've ever seen, up/down there with the time I saw Billy Corgan recite poetry while wearing an army helmet with lights shining out of it. The Knife being lame was noteworthy mostly because the Fever Ray show a few years back was one of the coolest things I've ever seen. What a missed opportunity. This kind of dumb non-spectacle could have been done smarter.

I wasn't into it either. Love the duelling vocals from Shannon and Karin though

bummed to have missed this show

there was too much non-dancing to pre-recorded stuff for me. that was at least 1/4 of the show. the tracks they actually performed live were pretty good, I thought.

What was with the doofus cheerleader who started the show?

I felt it was more than 1/4 pre-recorded, and frankly, I don't see the point of playing it live (was it even?) for part of the show, and then just relying on pre-recorded for the remainder. They could have billed it as a dance performance and it still would have been lame but maybe at least lame on its own terms. How much were tickets? $35? I guess on that front it could have been worse.

The worst thing about the show is that I was with a friend who kept saying "no, give it another song, maybe it's going to change/get better," and I kept responding, no, it really isn't. Like, I know that for a fact. And she kept going "just one more song ..." And it was so stupid. I would have rather gone out for dinner, come home, found my copy of "Shaking the Habitual" and not listened to it.

so how many of you picked up the let's talk about gender baby hoodie?

Perhaps I'm a rube who enjoys light shows set to pre-recorded music (and vocals much of the time), but if you know that going in it's not so bad. If you'd read anything about The Knife since they started performing this album nearly a year ago, you would have known that.

All I remember about the Fever Ray show was that Karin had a full band and it sounded heavy and there were a bunch of old lamps on stage.

But yeah, the "doofus cheerleader" reminded me of this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eyqUj3PGHv4

is this basically a redux of the same argument we had a year ago?

I just read upthread again and yes. Busted. However, while I'm on it I'll just say that watching StH stuff performed live, with a full band of musicians concentrating on playing instruments would have been THE MOST BORING OPTION AND NOT A KNIFE SHOW.

is this basically a redux of the same argument we had a year ago?

― lex pretend, Friday, April 25, 2014 8:02 AM (5 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

^^^

Holy shit, I forgot to brush up on what the thread had to say a year ago about a show I saw the other night, my bad. Maybe the Knife could have changed its show for the sake of ILX?

The Fever Ray show I saw had lamps and costumes and stuff, but the entire club was filled with a fog so thick you couldn't see clearly for more than a few feet, so all you could make out were these crazy Where the Wild Things Are shapes and glowing lights. And lasers. Like I said, there were a lot of ways the Knife could have done this show the way they did, but better/more interesting imo. I've seen plenty of theatrical exercises (many in the theater) that were pretty neat spectacles. As someone I know described this, it was like "Xanadu" crossed with Blue Man Group. Clearly some dig that. At least the group was having fun.

This is from when I saw them:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vocFZNeIXCE

urgh this hurts - still so gutted for not having the chance to see Fever Ray.
Don't care much about The Knife

is this basically a redux of the same argument we had a year ago?

Except that now some of us have actually seen the show :)

The problem I had was with the choreographed sections, they felt clumsy and endless and not at all subversive, reproductions of superior queer bands/performance pieces

Show is very reliant on pre-recordings; even the vocals on about a third of the songs, where the singers cede the stage to the dancers. Almost all the songs are different mixes. I loved the instrument design, especially the Log which is a six foot long piano wire strung along an odd sculpture which can be thwacked or bowed, and has percussion pads along the top. That thing sounded unbelievable. A few of the other onstage props turned out to be stealth percussion sets with microtonal tunings, and I liked the bits where the dancers would just start attacking those things; the mix would just explode.

I am not entirely sure the dancing worked either, but at the end of the Oakland show, instead of doing an encore, 'Silent Shout' crossfaded into an hour long set by local DJ Rapid Fire, and the 3000-person rock / concert venue turned into a dance party. Which was something I have rarely seen working on that scale; about half of the crowd trickled out, everyone else swarmed. I was with a friend who knows the band fairly well and wanted to say hi, so after they left the stage we went back to the reception area which was deserted; after about a minute a guard stopped by and said 'if you're looking for the band, they're all out there dancing' and sure enough. However it was executed, I took the message as 'you're supposed to be dancing yourselves, not watching' -- it's a tricky thing to use stage spectacle to say that, but I got it

Apart from Karin's unforgettable poetry interlude, what I liked most about the show was how the band was this joyous frantic bunch of loonies. Rather than projecting power at you, it seemed like they were just vibrating along with the music while playing choreographed air marimba. "Why are you impersonating a dead stereotype, look, we're alive."

Mind you I think the band was having way more fun than I was.

they felt clumsy and endless and not at all subversive, reproductions of superior queer bands/performance pieces

Yeah, along with Blue Man Group I flashed back to a Fischerspooner show I once saw, too.

Hey Josh. Have you ever thought about not being wrong?

I mean, I wasnt a huge fan of StH when I finally heard it and some ill advised dismissive stuff on this forum but the live show premise was discussed to death a year ago so your disapproval kind of merits being roundly mocked

Well they are touring north american just now. Can't we write our reactions to the show?

Basically, I really liked the concept and thought the execution was poor. I like the idea of anti-show, I really do. It's just that I feel it could have been so much more than cheap contemporary dancing. The fake instruments were great and they were left aside quite early. The poetry bit was a lot of fun and I liked the cheerleading intro, it's just that with all those costumes and light and and universe the Knife have created over the years (not even mentioning the politics) I felt they could have shown us the cosmos instead of silly dancing. I'm not asking them to play the hits and or even play the instrument, but surely they can do more than that. Perhaps they should associate with a contemporary circus troupe. Funnily, my mother was really into it, so that was a huge plus to the experience.

Also, some people on the ground level were really disappointed they couldn't see big parts of the stage.

Bf was there in MTL last night and he loved it way more as a stand-alone show. Funny: the musicians he went with incorporate a significant amount of playback into their own sets, and they were all "there's no musical performance going on!" and he was like "uhhh nobody can tell when you're playing anything either" lol

Mock away, strangers, but I have more cause to post on a thread about a show I just saw from an act only now touring where I live than you do posting just to tell me not to.

Actually I was way out of line Josh and I'm sorry. I regret being so disrespectful. I have no business saying stuff like that.

You are right in that it makes no impact in my life whether or not you go see this show, whether or not you know what it is going in, whether or nit you post your opinions itt

I don't know if you're being serious or not, but I'll take it. I'm easy.

Tbh I knew exactly what to expect from this show and warned my friend accordingly, but reading about it and seeing it are different things.

Also, some people on the ground level were really disappointed they couldn't see big parts of the stage.

I was there last night and I have to say I loved it a lot more once I went up on the mezzanine and had a view of the whole stage. Since there is no focus on a lead singer, I think it is meant to be seen as a whole thing. And there was more room for dancing!

Oh and I met Olof at the after show party and he was really charming and friendly and good looking :-)

Interestingly, I was sitting above the crowd, and I didn't see many people dancing at all. I'm sure somewhere there was someone losing their shit, but from my vantage it looked like a lot of standing around.

(Ps yeah I am serious)

The crowd was dancing in Montréal:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i_XhiKO_SQA#t=129

That's the last song they play, and an older song, too - were they dancing before that, as far as you could tell?

Where I was people were definitely dancing, both on the floor and on the balcony.

yeah, i never felt a balcony of this size shaking this way, that was incredible. i was dancing as well. i mean, rereading what i wrote i feel i am bit ungrateful, i mostly liked it.

Sounds like these shows are a real litmus test, very divisive and often entirely dependent on your own vantage point as to whether you enjoy them or not.

Generally enjoyed the show. Some aspects could have been better I guess (the choreographies could have been better on some songs, that spoken word thing did nothing for me). I definitely agree that having a good view of the stage is necessary to fully appreciate it. Really enjoyed the updated versions of We Share Our Mother's Health and Bird (actually the first 5 or so songs were all incredible).

I will be the first admit that I preferred the silly, pretentious mess I saw (imo) to most shows, because in 10 years I am more likely to remember this one than many of the more conventionally "good" shows I see. I honestly do prefer a band be controversial or divisive than complacent. I just wish I dug it more. Like I said, lots of (I felt) unforced errors, especially since the group has had time to retool things, if it wanted. Dancing could have been better or more interesting (imo). Politics/message could have been better presented/focused/developed. Opening cheerleader could have been excised. Poetry did nothing for me, though it worked as inadvertent self-parody. I guess I would have greatly preferred it not as a concert but as a proper show, at a theater, with maybe a narrative or something, a la the group's Darwin opera. Or even what the Pet Shop Boys do, performing/replicating songs but situated in the context of pretty focused show, wth A/V and dancing and songs all supporting one another. The mere two dancers on the last PSB tour, with the horned masks, I thought were more interesting and compelling and effective and affecting than the Knife's dayglo troupe.

otm

Like I said, I hated it but they're still my favourite band and would see it again

;_; I had to give my tickets to tonight's show to CAD

Anybody have a pair of tickets to Thursdays show in Nyc that they'd be willing to trade for wed? Pls email dan at acuterecords if so!

xp dan i wish you had been there tonite because i genuinely would have loved to get your take on it

I loved the show.

also:

http://www.brooklynvegan.com/archives/2014/05/karin_of_the_kn.html

I was down with this until they started dumping bedpans full of shit on each other, still a tour remix album sounds very exciting

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NcXg_p-Yj18

That video is like an alternate world version of an episode of Glee.

tbf the tour here was at terminal 5 which is a comparable experience to having bedpans full of shit dumped on you (the venue, not the tour)

I was warned about the wed show so I showed up extra early to the thur show and stood on the balcony just behind the light people with a counter in front of me and the throngs behind.

Okay, from that description there is every possibility I was like five feet away from you at that show

New:

Europa Europa and The Knife -- För alla namn vi inte får använda
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5jMXZBPW-Q0