Much has already been written of the sort of lo-fi psych-garage delivered (both live and recorded) by the Alps and Ohsees, and while their merits were certainly in effect at the show, I'd rather take this space to offer a bit of an introduction to Ty Segall. Also hailing from San Francisco, and also representing a slice of our current appreciation for lo-fi, Segall distinguishes himself by playing completely solo, recreating classic garage sounds with only heavy, clanging guitar riffs, distorted voice, and minor but effective foot-operated percussion. Segall's hot, clipped production style is well suited to the simple, hooky familiarity of his songwriting, as well as his chosen medium on past releases: cassette tapes, several of them released by notable Bay Area house/collective/label Wizard Mountain. It is worth noting that Segall was equally adept at jumping into the Sic Alps set on drums for a few tracks, a couple of which he hadn't ever played on before.
It is also worth mentioning that the current Zs set, a single rigorous work for jaggedly precise sax, drums and electric guitar, showed considerable mutation from its original presentation in June. Then, the work was a rigid series of exacting repetition structures like Zs' excellent most recent release The Hard EP (incidentally their last recorded work in older four-piece configuration), but here was presented in a slightly looser form. Though probably no less exacting for its participants, the piece seemed to have gained a measure of elbow room, space within its precision cycles for bits of white-hot free-jazz squeal to spark away, different each pass. The set served as bracing, pallet-cleansing centerpiece for the night.
More on: psychothriller, sic alps, the oh sees, ty seagull, zs
See more Photos in Scene and Heard | Browse all Photos
HIPSTER GRIFTER!!!
— Choam Nomsky on September 22, 2009