The Syndicate

The prices were ridiculous here as well. 2 euros for a Pepsi.

I suggest everyone who has a Sigur Rós concert in sight this summer or fall to not miss out on the occasion, they might just blow your socks off. This wasn't even the first time I saw them (Maribor, Slovenia, three years ago), but it was like a calling, given that they now played near another Nauruan town, and I felt I needed this in my life. I am pretty drugged on any material from ( ), which put me in an embarassing mood to sing along, feel entranced or spazz out during the climaxes. But I got what I wanted. This was also a first for me to go to a big festival (even if just for one day), something that I should have realistically done 5-10 years ago. Interesting if flawed ambiance, more of a cornucopia of youthful discharge than something music-centered. Thankfully, anything that I did there, nobody will ever know.
With a bit more objectivity I could say the following about the concert.

Good
-- Popplagið. Would literally go to a hundred concerts just for this.
-- There is true spectacle and even some catharsis in this experience.
-- Jónsi got pretty mad out there, pretty sure wrecking a couple of bows and a guitar's strings along the way.

Mixed / Neutral
-- The new song they opened with, Óveður, really needs an album context. It has potential for some darker expressions, but alongside the rest of the setlist, it's just a bit eery and doesn't really catch fire.
-- SR aren't really a band full of surprises. Five years from now, they might very well perform and tour the same well-prepared way. To paraphrase a friend I met during the concert, they brought their hits. It's about as fulfilling as relistening to an album can be, which isn't necessarily a bad thing. Neutral balance between all their albums (save Von, nothing particular to note here either.

Problematic
-- This three-man formation could occasionally leave something to be desired. At times, you could sense that at least half of the material for any given piece is running in the background, confining the band even more to play a strict rendition. I remember they had a backup band three years ago, when (mostly) promoting Valtari. I feel they could use backup players for the concerts.





Setlist: Óveður, Starálfur, Sæglópur, Glósóli, Vaka, Ný Batterí, E-Bow, Festival, Yfirborð, Kveikur, Hafsól, Popplagið

I've "ticked another box" this weekend by going to Budapest to see in concert another one of my favourite artists, the jazz legend Keith Jarrett. I'd say it had everything I expected and wanted to hear, but would I rank it among the finest concerts? Not sure about it.

His brilliance is unquestionable and his long-time coined style of improvising and generating content on the spot seemed perfectly legit (and hence intimidating), but his strange character also inevitably surfaced - and I ain't talking about the midplay grunting and tap dancing. Mostly banter with the audience that ranged from cheeky to awkward. Plus, there's always the fear of him having meltdowns during performances if there's any interference whatsoever (photos being taken, noises and coughs) and, oddly, even such a moment found its place in this experience, as he berated the audience when some finally started taking photos at seemingly the very last round of applauses. I can understand the ideal he's promoting (or at least the general unpleasantness of the things he's so averse to), but it was still awfully pedantic of him to complain even then, when for the rest of the show, we all "behaved" almost exemplary.

Back to the music, his late years style has evolved to some rather chaotic, free-jazz oriented lenghts, although I would rather describe as the type of language old masters tend to develop or break apart, in a way that transcends any usual understanding of genre and limits. And we got a chunky first set of this, which I personally dug a lot; even felt a strong modern classical vibe to it, a la Bartok (which would be a corny thought, given the occasion, but then Jarrett himself started chatting during an intermission about his Hungarian heritage and how he might intend to touch base during this performance, so maybe I wasn't far off). At times his logic had amazing clarity, if you could follow the lines within the whirling technique more closely; in other pieces, the generated effect of the music was more valuable - some very dark and striking.

The second set seemed designed to entertain the crowd after all, with some more old fashioned playing, as in ballads, heavy grooves and free melodies, which was fine, if just a bit short during each extract. Odd moments crept in even here, as he occasionally showed signs of being unsure what else to produce (or his mood dropping to do so) or he simply interrupted a piece, because he felt it "wasn't going anywhere". But can I declare that this really detracted anything? It was still hearing him the way he usually tends to be: versatile and volatile, quite at the same time.

I'd gladly time skip my own concerts, if it would be possible, but that comes down to how much anxiety I have in performing.

Otherwise, I love band concerts most of the time, to the point that I'm wondering what's wrong with me, acting like a grumpy, selective hater when I listen to music, but having a blast when it's all live. Jethro Tull, Esbjorn Svensson, John Zorn, Van der Graaf, Sigur Ros, Godspeed, Peter Hammill, plus a ton of jazz bands - none of this was disappointing.