Voltage vs Mothra

Voltage and Mothra; there's a bug-zapper joke in there somewhere, I'm sure. I came out to this show to see Mothra play, and was happy to have caught them again, but I was pleasantly surprised by Chicago's Voltage.

Noise all over the place tonight; the Chicago duo, Voltage, helps show that noise doesn't have to be painful, and that experimental music goes far beyond random screams and can even be tuneful and melodic. Okay, there were seemingly random screams in a couple of the musical breaks, but they still were able to hold a tune.

There's a small piece of video from the end of Voltage's set if you read the extended... just the last two minutes or so.

From their record label's biography:

Live, Bailey plays a vacuum-tube based synthesizer of his own design which is controlled by a modified guitar [...] On the other end, you will find Schwartz playing a drum kit of his own concoction, consisting of a Frankenstein assortment of marching and rock drums, a glockenspiel, battery operated motors, microphones, and more recently, a laptop configured for live sampling.

I picked up the album Build The Bass Castle: Vol. 1 and it's some solid work. It's one of those rare instances when the recorded effort is, possibly even better than the live act; tighter and more controlled, but without sacrificing the vitality of the live show.

Listen to the track named 04. Neither of the bands I witnessed here tonight appear to be fans of titling their songs, it would seem, as the Mothra album I picked up last year listed "Untitled I" as the first track, and counted up from there.