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Massive Thief are a band. That is their salient truth, the telepathic and impassioned thrust that has powered eight years and 5 albums of rustic loft-rock. They could be the one big-flight 2010s indie group the place information of, like, the rhythm part being changed would produce a large outcry of “dude… that’s fucked up.”
Yeah, yeah, you’re saying. “Massive Thief trip the ‘we’re a band’ factor laborious.” That hasn’t been any kind of deep crucial perception since… I wanna say, 2018? Actually no later than that one press photograph of them piled collectively into a bath… or giving one another piggyback rides… or biking down Flatbush Avenue on unicycles (I made one in all these up). However, however, it bares restating: Massive Thief, deliberately or not, broadcast the truth that “they’re a band,” and to this present day it feels as if individuals’s opinions are inclined to proceed straight from this truth. You’ll be able to take a look at our indie period — outlined by solo singer-songwriters and auteurs — and really feel cynical about this as aware counter-programing (when your frontperson has the power to attract pleading, completely honest yearn out of phrases like “warbling” and “blood bloom”… effectively, yeah, that’s some generational oomph for a rhythm part to cope with). You’ll be able to take heed to the tambourine components and lyrics about potatoes and roll your eyes on the close-knit unity pose as a kind of granola-millennial endpoint. Or you possibly can imagine in it, and I actually do. Possibly these are simply 4 uniquely delicate artists — as attuned to the depth of a mellow Saturday afternoon within the solar as they’re emotional devastation and heartbreak. Regardless of a seeming lack of ability to seek the advice of each other on gown code, it is a band that subordinates every part to the unguided, hive-mind whims of its psychic folkie interaction.
My assumption had been that the majority Massive Thief followers put their belief in that judgment, or no less than give it some crucial room for error. However possibly the roiling tempo of web fandom in 2023 is just too resting-fascist to place its religion in a band that reworks its setlist every evening and churns its tightest pop constructions into sprawling noise-feedback jams! All I can say for sure is that, earlier than headlining Pitchfork Music Pageant set Saturday evening (they beforehand performed the Chicago occasion in 2019), the band’s most up-to-date social media submit addressed followers grousing over the just-released studio model of reside favourite “Vampire Empire.”
The chief comparability seems to be their recording for The Late Present With Stephen Colbert earlier this yr. Complaints appear to concern the condensed runtime, some funky drum mixing, and a lacking flute. “We weren’t gonna go into the studio and attempt to replicate what we performed on Colbert… plus there’s no method it might’ve been the identical, as a result of songs are vessels for the expressions of our current selves,” the band wrote, “and never extremely manicured concoctions polished to be consumed primarily based on demand.” It’s shocking they even acknowledged the criticism. Possibly some deep a part of their artistry acquired rattled. The a part of Massive Thief that’s outer-conscious, the half that may’t be managed — even by Adrianne Lenker. The a part of Massive Thief that’s inextricably a band.
However I’m standing there watching Buckley Meek (earlier within the day he introduced on the DoorDash interview stage that he was going by Buckley to any extent further) doing these goofy little “no, no” head shakes as a wailing Lenker reverse engineers the ground-shaking, head-fucking rush of pure love from all of the issues that it isn’t (“not the gang successful,” “not the planet spinning,” and so forth, you realize the tune) and I actually do suppose to no one is gonna get that if the band doesn’t have room to fuck round. That it’s all “just a little bit magic,” even when it doesn’t work or isn’t fairly completed. And that’s what I believe earlier than Lenker busts out some skronk guitar that may make Metallic Machine Music-era Lou Reed go “ayyyyyyyy.” (Additionally featured final evening: a herky-jerk avant-solo from her on “Simulation Swarm” that may make Gregg Ginn go “wooooooo” and an trustworthy to god dying growl on “Contact.” I’m not saying Lenker may have additionally headlined the hardcore fest trollishly taking part in literal meters down the block, however… in fact that’s what I’m saying.)
In fact, that’s the trade-off to any kind of creative spontaneity — as a Saturday evening efficiency dotted by workshop-y jaunts by way of new materials, sheepish stage patter, and a pair lengthy pauses ready for distraction to move made clear. You most likely shouldn’t count on regular, headliner-polish from it. For an ‘period defining’ sorta band, Massive Thief are actually not ones to flex extra-musical razzle dazzle or mystique (I’m assuming at my very own peril that your definition of “extra-musical razzle dazzle” doesn’t embody “perpetually topless bassist Max Oleartchik,” although it appears vital to notice that this night he and drummer James Krivchenia had been carried on and off stage with a great deal of goonish aplomb). They enter with no word of pre-recorded sonic lead-on, play the massive songs on their setlist at seemingly random intervals, and scrunch along with all their gear and carry out in a straight line like they’re characters in A Mighty Wind or one thing.
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