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Sunday, October 25
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The Dodos
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w/ The Ruby Suns
Ticket Price: $15.00 adv / $15.00 dos
Doors at 8:00 PM, Show at 9:00 PM
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The Dodos
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With a title like Time To Die, you might think the Dodos' third disc is their 'mature album,' a deadly serious undertaking punctuated with string sections and synths. Nice try kid, but you've got it all wrong. While indie rock's go-to guy, Phil Ek (Built to Spill,Fleet Foxes, The Shins), hopped behind the boards this time, the Dodos' wildly percussive style is still centered around two key elements: the punchy percussion of Logan Kroeber and the Fahey-infused finger-picking of front man Meric Long. Oh sure,you'll hear a horn blast here and there, but it's never enough to distract you from the group's riffs and rolls.
'I'm glad that we were able to keep things simple on this record,' says Long, 'Because when your band gets a little popular, there's this tendency to say things like, 'Let's add an orchestra on this one!' That works for some people, but it would detract from this band.'Indeed, and as right as Long may be, Time To Die introduces one major addition to the Dodos' creative core: Keaton Snyder, a 21-year-old music school dropout who plays a mean vibraphone. As Long puts it, 'He's a better musician than Logan and I combined. I don't even know what's going on with his music theory ideas half the time.' On a similar note, Snyder-a classically-trained musician-is constantly learning what 'being in a band' entails. In fact, he didn't even know how to react when a chord was yanked during his Dodos debut. 'After the show,' says Long, 'he was like, 'Yeah, I've never had to plug anything in before.' It was hilarious.'
All jokes aside, you'd never know Snyder was the Dodos' third man without looking at the new album's liner notes. Not because he's missing in action half the time; he's just locked in step with Long's steady-handed strumming and Kroeber's canon-like beats.That, and Snyder's actual sound/physical presence isn't all that different than the visceral elements explored on the Dodos' previous two albums, 2006's Beware of the Maniac and the band's buzz-stirring breakthrough, 2008's Visiter.
'The vibraphone is pretty crazy and loud,' says Long, 'and if you put it through some effects, you can make it sound like a guitar or synthesizer. It still has that element of something you're hitting, though, which is central to how Logan and I play our instruments.'
That's the thing about Time To Die: It expands the Dodos' Ginsu-sharp sound without smothering it. It's not the death of everything you adored about the duo; it's a rebirth,revealing some serious career standouts (the wide screen payoff of 'Small Deaths,' the string-and-drum spasms of 'Long form,' the delicate/distorted dynamics of Snyder's' Troll Nacht' parts) along the way. Which isn't a surprise when you hear how many months they spent writing the damn thing earlier this year.'After Visiter, we had a lot of options for which direction to go,' says Long, 'But I knew we wanted a make a rock record. Being an acoustic band-primarily, at least-sort of works against this idea, but Phil's production showcased that side of our band.'
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The Ruby Suns
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Phones ring and field recordings follow: footsteps in a friend's backyard, getting drunk at a bar in Chicago, screaming kids at an indoor pool, and Kenyan rug makers singing. All of these sounds churn within tidal tape manipulations. Relating to a small, solitary sea bird on the opening track of Sea Lion, Ryan McPhun sings, 'The great Pacific can connect you with your relatives.'
McPhun was born and raised in the seaside town of Ventura, CA. Eventually his hunger for travel and new experiences led him to his newfound home away from home. New Zealand has offered Ryan its mountainous South Island, rugged beaches and the North Island's enchanted forests, to which Ryan replies with sounds he has borrowed and fashioned from machine, Manuka trees and many a musical instrument. Although New Zealand is somewhat isolated in the southern most part of the Pacific Ocean, Ryan has remained true to his buccaneer instinct. He and his Dictaphone (portable tape recorder) have ventured into the wilds of Africa, the ancient monasteries of Thailand, and the haunting landscapes that surround his everyday.
In 2004 McPhun gathered some like-minded Kiwi wanderers and formed the band Ryan McPhun and The Ruby Suns. He also enjoyed stints in various Auckland-based pop groups including The Tokey Tones, The Reduction Agents, and The Brunettes, with whom he toured the US with The Shins and Rilo Kiley both in '05. McPhun also plays drums, percussion and background vocals on The Brunettes recent Sub Pop release Structure and Cosmetics.
The band is now shortly, sweetly and simply called The Ruby Suns. At present the live band consists of Ryan McPhun, Amee Robinson, and Imogen Taylor.
Over the past four years the band has savoured various successes. In 2005 they signed to NZ indie label Lil' Chief Records and released their debut self-titled album, securing their ongoing student radio stardom. In 2006 this album was released through Memphis Industries (home of The Go! Team and Field Music among others) in the UK/Europe and through the Popfrenzy label in Australia. Not bad for a band that records their own music at home, makes their own artwork and to this day is completely self-managed.
The band set forth to play the South by Southwest festival in Austin, TX in 2006, and from there launched a cross-country tour of the US. Or they attempted to anyway: en route to a show in the Pacific NW, the motor home they were travelling in caught fire and very literally burnt to the ground with all their belongings and equipment inside. The band could do little but watchas instruments and equipment roasted ablaze on the lonely horizon. Destitute and on the verge of giving up the band rallied together and miraculously (presumably through some combination of borrowed equipment, the kindness of strangers, wire, smoke, and mirrors) managed to finish the tour and returned home in triumph.
This latest album from The Ruby Suns is titled Sea Lion, the name of which is inspired by the sea lion colony visible from Hwy 1, south of San Francisco. Recorded by McPhun alone in his Auckland basement, Sea Lion's melodic musings found inspiration in the natural world and his travels within it. 'Tane Mahuta,' sung entirely in Maori, is an indigenous-sounding ode to the great Waipoua forest near Auckland and 'Adventure Tour' tells a tale of a memorable drive through New Zealand's South Island. An African influence also exerts a strong presence in the album. Not only was he struck by the people ('Ole Rinka' is about a man he met in the Maasai Mara National Reserve), but he was also enamoured of the music, especially Kenyan traditional music and modern day hip-hop.
The depth and breadth of the Ruby Suns' songs has, to no surprise, grown dramatically since their 2005 self-titled debut. The epic Sea Lion was intended to be a world music album, but reverb and psychedelic pop crept back in to create a unique mixture of exotic sounds, accomplished with an impressive array of instrumentsfrom steel-string ukulele to djembe drums to pots and pans, all set upon a cosy cushion of synths and cassette samples. The Ruby Suns perfectly describe their wide-ranging influences with: 'Pop music, noise, psychedelia, flamenco, South Pacific, southern Africa, home recording, hiking, travelling, animals, beaches, vegetarian food, especially falafel.'
Sea Lion will be released through the following labels in the following parts of the world, but all especially for you: Sub Pop (US), Memphis Industries (UK/EU), Popfrenzy (Australia), and Lil' Chief (New Zealand).
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