Detroit Bar – Costa Mesa, CA
Live Review: 9/28/11

The last time I spoke with drummer Austin Tufts of BRAIDS, he described the band’s current live performance as having more “energy and fire” to its rhythmic feel. It’s hard to imagine how much more energy this four-piece could have, given their outstanding performance as an opener for Toro Y Moi back in March. Showing off some new songs and mastering those from their debut album, BRAIDS returned to the Detroit Bar on Wednesday night demonstrating their on-stage chemistry and building up to several cathartic moments.

It was a quiet night at the usually packed Detroit Bar. Starting with San Francisco psychedelic pop band Painted Palms, the night’s bill attracted a few stragglers who mustered enough energy to peel themselves away from the bar. Painted Palms makes sense as an opener for BRAIDS. They’re both acolytes of the Animal Collective sound: a dreamy swirl of electronic sounds and harmonized melodies. “Canopy” sounds like the buoyant, tropical psychedelia of Panda Bear, while “Falling Asleep” is a cheerful, sunny ode to dreams and somnambulism.

After Painted Palms, LA locals Pepper Rabbit took the stage to perform songs off their latest record Red Velvet Snowball. Band members Xander Singh and Luc Laurent are skilled multi-instrumentalists, but for their live show, the former stuck to bass while the other played keyboard and guitar, while adding a third member on drums. Their new songs have a strong folk feel similar to that of San Francisco’s Dodos, and their sound would fit right in with the Woodsist catalog. They’ve got a great set of songs (“Allison,” “The Annexation of Puerto Rico” and “Rose Mary Stretch”) which are strong on melodies if not always on lyrics.

Finally, after a pre-show group hug that’s customary to the band, members of BRAIDS got on stage to start their set with two unreleased songs. Like their name suggests, the band plays as a braided unit, each member being essential to their layers of sounds and harmonies. When performing percussion duties in tandem, Austin Tufts and multi-instrumentalist Taylor Smith looked like doppelgängers of each other (both are tall, thin and bespectacled). Singer Raphaelle Standell-Preston and keyboardist Katie Lee shared primary vocals, although every member contributed harmonies, played with effects, whispered soft noises and played at least one instrument.

Songs like “Lemonade” and “Plath Heart” sounded ethereal on stage, while one of their new songs experimented with polyrhythms with a now fine-tuned sound that seemed performed on a whim or improvised. At the core of their new songs, the band seemed to be liberated, both lyrically and sonically, and moving past the meticulous efforts of Native Speaker and on to brighter territory.

BRAIDS continues their North American tour through October before embarking on another European tour in November.

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http://braidsmusic.com/

http://pepperrabbitmusic.com/

http://paintedpalms.bandcamp.com/