On their own, Dengue Fever is an incredible live act. The thing that made their recent show at Berbati’s Pan special, though, wasn’t just their performance, but also the line up for the evening as a whole.
Pink Widower opened the evening with a horn-heavy set list of poppy indie songs. The group has a distinctly peppy sound, and the sheer amount of brass involved in their music gives their tunes weight and a marching-band quality that harkens back to green grass and sunshine.
Following Pink Widower was Tu Fawning, a four-piece group of multi-instrumentalists who packed a whole lot of talent and quite a few instruments onto the stage. Sounding somewhat akin to dream popsters Beach House, the band evokes a moodier, darker sound with lead singer Corrina Repp’s rich, sultry vocals leading the way. Members bounced from instrument to instrument, picking up and putting down various guitars, percussion instruments, and a couple different horns to create a rich, varied soundscape.
In comparison with Tu Fawning’s darker tone, Dengue Fever was a veritable carnival of sound. The six-piece band—famous for mixing psychedelic rock with elements of Cambodian pop music—has a distinctly international sound in their music. Lead singer Chhom Nimol was a joy to hear as her voice soared out over a gyrating crowd. The band as a whole had an amazing energy, with all of the members moving around the stage and occasionally jumping up and down in time to the music.
Their instrumentation and performance style had a similar feel to that of bands like Os Mutantes in the way that they arranged their songs and the energy they projected. Nimol’s vocal stylings are reminiscent of classic Bollywood singers like Asha Boshle and Lata Mangeshkar, smooth and melodic against the explosive sound from the rest of the band. At one point, Nimol called on the audience to sing along with her to the classic Cambodian song “Penh Jet Thai Bong Mouy.”
Towards the end of their set, the band slid into more of a jam-band style of playing, with songs dragging out and meshing into one another. The performance never seemed forced, and the group made the more improvisational part of their set sound natural and laid-back.
Finishing off their set, the band was called back to the stage by a cheering audience hungry for an encore. They played a few more songs and finally called it a night, but Dengue Fever’s wonderfully enticing music and highly engaging performance will not be one to forget anytime soon.
