Calling Akron/Family eclectic is almost too obvious, but it really does fit, as evidenced by their diverse palette of indie folk, prog rock, spacey jams and noise freak-outs on display Thursday night at the SOhO Restaurant & Music Club in Santa Barbara.
The trio consists of Dana Janssen, Miles Seaton and Seth Olinsky, and was pared down from a quartet when Ryan Vanderhoof left a few years ago to live in a Buddhist Dharma center in the Midwest. Things started off with a Fripp-and-Eno-esque drone courtesy of processed cheap keyboards, leading into a tape recording of a woman singing in some unknown language.
It seemed to take the crowd a while to realize that the performance had actually begun, but when they did they were all on board for a cosmic sonic trip. The drone segued into the delicate “We All Will,” featuring guitar bowed by a drumstick and rough three-part harmonies.
The band then led the audience in clapping a “1 2-and and-4” rhythm for the intro to “River,” which proceeded in a standard guitar, bass, drums format but with less-standard spacey interludes.
A slow, distorted drum loop emerged from the previous song’s final atmospherics, and as it played Olinsky led the audience in a relaxation exercise, then instructed them to point their right hands in the air and sway back and forth to the mellow “Island” — the first of a string of songs from their new album S/T II: The Cosmic Birth and Journey of Shinju TNT. This ended with an extended noisy freak-out that led into “AAA O A Way” and “So It Goes.”
Continuing the sequencing of the new album and with a guest appearance by guitarist Steve Marion and amazing drummer Mike Duncan from openers Delicate Steve, the band launched into “Another Sky,” which they stretched out to epic proportions with a sing-along, a visit into the audience and some mesmerizing tribal drumming. Definitely a show highlight.
Next up were the more subdued tracks “The Meek Warrior” and “Crickets,” followed by the set-closing rocker “Silly Bears,” which has a Sleigh Bells-like riff and more three-part harmonies. As an encore, after a delightfully noisy freak-out, the band closed with the proggy “Light Emerges.”
It was Akron/Family’s first Santa Barbara show, and this reviewer hopes their cosmic journey makes it back to these parts soon.
— Noozhawk contributor Jeff Moehlis is an associate professor of mechanical engineering at UCSB. Upcoming show recommendations, advice from musicians, interviews and more are available on his Web site, music-illuminati.com.
Comments
