October 30th, 2009
Seattle, WA
Staring at the blank canvas in our wooden-framed prefabbed seats, the 'stage' of a plushly carpeted floor and an amp mini-stack seems quite unassuming. However, looks are always deceiving when stepping into Dissonant Plane. Yes, it is a 'record' store by all accounts but its growing tentacles are ever-so tightly wrapping themselves around Seattle's blossoming noise and avant scene. For so long Seattle has played host to grunge cast-offs, bad party bands, and the occasionally talented--although formulaic--post rock crew. With the emergence of vinyl currency and an upstairs haven in the belly of a spectacular turntable and speaker store, Dissonant Plane's rather white and tan versus black and glass facade is more foreboding than one can fathom at first sight.
So here we sat on the eve of All Hallow's Eve, waiting patiently for Acid Mothers Temple honcho Kawabata Makoto to occupy the slice of upstairs real estate and splash the walls with brain matter and ear drums. Little did we expect that such a ecstatic atrocity would happen before Makoto connected his pedals and plugged into the solitary amp.
The night began with San Francisco's Aerial Ruin. As one might guess from his long hair, scraggly beard, and acoustic guitar, Aerial Ruin took his cues from metal riffs and folkish mentality. As anyone familiar with the blend can attest, they work much like chocolate and steak: intriguingly tasty. Aerial Ruin has some work to do to become a worthy champion of the stage but his brief set was gentle, full of spry notes, and never dull. His switches between humbled vocals and ominous whispers were shiver inducing and had the crowd been aware of what was up next, they would have taken Aerial Ruin's signs as omens.
Berliner ?Alos graced us next and no one could have been prepared for her satanic onslaught. Despite a room of 20 and the plush environs in which to work, ?Alos produced 20 minutes of terror, intrigue, anxiety, and animosity the likes of Yoko Ono's work in boxes. Armed with a strand of white Christmas lights, a first generation Buddha Machine, and hair longer than her vertical stand, ?Alos calmly worked her way around the room, sharing a viscous substance with random audience members despite the Swine Flu scare. Her monotone chant was soothing yet troubling and if not for the Buddha Machine's precarious placement atop the amplifier stack, one would have wondered what was hiding in the weeds--or her hair.
We soon found out as ?Alos finally made her way to the staging area. She calmly turned on her pink Buddha Machine and let loose with an exorcising Linda Blair could dare not reenact. Tiny bells, cymbals, and trinkets jangled and swayed in anger as ?Alos spoke an unfamiliar tongue in fits of vitriolic fury; her caterwauls of pain and anguish barely broken by the clanging of her dreaded cymbals and skeletal castanets. The thunderous stomps and spooky wails ?Alos emitted all while gently swaying her dominant mane was debilitating. I dared not move for fear of becoming the center of her storm--and trust me, there was no eye in sight. Each movement and audible emission was unnerving yet all the while, I could not look away. ?Alos taps into a primeval need to pay heed to her incoherent but recognizable warnings. The woman that emerged after the performance could not have been more opposite than the creature who confidently and defiantly strode into Dissonant Plane with vengeance on her plate.
As we slowly recovered from ?Alos' all-out performance, Kawabata Makoto began to unpack his gear from a suitcase--fresh from a transcontinental flight. After some battles with his equipment, Makoto began a lengthy piece of bow-on-guitar drone. He promised us "sleepy' music and though the mood was calm and the melody soothing, there was nothing to draw an eyelid to slumber. Rather than unleashing the burning acid bath commonly associated with Acid Mothers Temple, Makoto displayed a gentle touch as he weaved a simplistic tapestry of drone around the audience. Unlike ?Alos, Makoto is not about appearance or bombastic performance. His music is about construction; layering sounds while abolishing others until a balance is achieved. There were times when Makoto's experiments squealed with high-pitched fever and threatened to topple his creation but as any artist can willingly attest you must stand at the edge to learn your limits. Makoto glared into the abyss below but did not blink, bringing Makoto's organized chaos to a polite conclusion.
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