Live Review: Animal Collective, Black Dice @ State Theatre in St. Petersburg, FL (6/8/09)
Animal Collective is playing Bonnaroo this year, but they are playing a short set in the middle of the day against other acts I want to see, so I decided to make the trek down to St. Pete, Florida and catch a proper AnCo show. I got to the venue two hours before it opened and there was already a few people camping out. By the time they began letting people in, the lie was running around the block. The opener was Black Dice, and while I was excited to check them out, I was very disappointed with their show. I’m a huge fan of noise jamming bands, but that doesn’t mean all noise performances are created equal and I’ve seen too many great acts doing something similar. I feel like I could take a random person off the street, get them really drunk, and let them play with a studio’s worth of gadgets and they would do something more interesting than Black Dice did. I can’t recall ever witnessing something so over-the-top intense yet so boring. Clearly these guys are hype-by-association.
After an hour that unfortunately felt like three, it was time for the main event. The Collective brought with them a custom lighting system that was simple but incredible. They had a giant sphere hanging from the ceiling at the front, middle of the stage with a projector shining trippy video animation over it. Underneath each of their 4 equipment tables, they draped thin, white cloth around it and had lighting racks hidden underneath to illuminate through. Then they had a huge image of the Merriweather Post Pavilion album cover behind them with lights shining off it making it do really crazy looking optical illusions. It was the perfect visual enhancement for their show.
They began their set with about 30 or 40 minutes of slow, droney, atmospheric building stuff. Then ,just at the moment I began losing interest in it, out of nowhere they dropped “My Girls” and the crowd started going wild. From then on to the set closer of “Brothersport” they did nothing but upbeat jams and it was a total dance party in there. I can’t remember the last time I saw a DJ rock a party as hard as these guys did for the bulk of their show. Panda Bear was on point, and The Geologist has made head bobbing with a headlamp an art, but Avey Tare stole the show this time. At one point he did this dancey guitar jamout that was just insane. Driving a thousand miles by myself to catch a show was a steep gamble, but in the end, it was more than worth it as this third AnCo show I’ve seen was by far the best.
I was struck by the bulk of the audience seemingly almost all about high school age and from the various conversations I overheard, these kids knew their stuff when it comes to good new music. It seems like this quiet Internet revolution keeps on growing without any signs of slowing and I’m getting the impression more and more that it would be hard to find a city in this country right now that doesn’t have a healthy indie-blog-music-style culture. The venue held about 700 people and looked very much like the Variety Playhouse but smaller. Maybe it was the acoustics and the way the thing was set up, but it has been a long time since I’ve heard a crowd so loud and enthusiastically demand an encore. Everyone in the balcony was stomping and rumbling, and pretty much every single person in that place was screaming at the top of their lungs. They came on and did a few last numbers, and closed the encore out with one of my personal favs, “Leaf House”.
All in all, seeing what will probably go down as this decade’s best band in their prime is about as good as it gets. I got a few videos during the beginning, but I was dancing too hard to capture any other krunker moments:
- Posted by Davy Minor on June 10, 2009 at 4:44 am
2 Responses to “Live Review: Animal Collective, Black Dice @ State Theatre in St. Petersburg, FL (6/8/09)”
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Anonymous Says:
June 11th, 2009 at 4:17 pm
Ouch, those are some harsh comments about Black Dice. They’ve actually been around longer than Animal Collective…but they’re much more obscure and honestly I feel since they’re less dance and groove oriented, fans who picked up on A.C circa Strawberry Jam era would never understand their music or express a sincere interest in it. It’s weird shit.
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your replacement Says:
June 14th, 2009 at 5:14 am
Wish i could have been there instead of you. I could have gotten one of those sweet black dice t-shirts. Who’s AnCo by the way?
Post a comment.
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Anonymous Says:
June 11th, 2009 at 4:17 pm
Ouch, those are some harsh comments about Black Dice. They’ve actually been around longer than Animal Collective…but they’re much more obscure and honestly I feel since they’re less dance and groove oriented, fans who picked up on A.C circa Strawberry Jam era would never understand their music or express a sincere interest in it. It’s weird shit.
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your replacement Says:
June 14th, 2009 at 5:14 am
Wish i could have been there instead of you. I could have gotten one of those sweet black dice t-shirts. Who’s AnCo by the way?
