It’s been five years since Death From Above 1979 broke up, which made the announcement of their reunion tour, which was to feature a stop at this year’s Sasquatch!, too good to be true. Their song “Little Girl” still ranks up there as one of my favorite dance rock songs of all time, and it was exciting to imagine the exhilaration they would come with playing of it, and every other hit from their fantastic 2004 release, You’re A Woman, I’m A Machine.
Instead, what ended up happening felt more like slight shock to my system, as I spent most of an hour trying to figure out what the hell had happened to this band I cherished. For the most part, I didn’t like it at all – singer Sebastien Grainger had such a wailing whine to his vocals that when they were coupled with the squealing bass of Jesse F. Keeler, it felt as if they’d reinvented themselves into a junior high punk rock group. “Black History Month” was fell victim to this. What a shame it was to see/hear such a great song reworked into a jumbled mess of sounds.
Not all tunes were failures – “Little Girl” had dead-on bass/drum timing and it's slowed down structure, and quiet lyrics, made for a sexy groove. There were also times where the duo would intensely pound out a rhythm with only their instruments, and oddly enough, it was the lack of vocals that made it some of their best stuff of the night. Keeler would perform double duty later on at the festival, as part of his electronic punk outfit, MSTRKRFT, but I missed them to catch the Modest Mouse set at another stage. What I did see of Keeler combined moments of brilliance with moments of despair, and it worried me for the continued future of DFA 1979. Hopefully they’ll reconnect with the brand of noise rock they were made famous by, and find their innovative selves once again.
