Stagestruck

THE LEGENDARY PINK DOTS
@Elysium, Austin, TX
June 14, 2004
I've been reading about the Legendary Pink Dots in the Trouser Press Record Guide and the All Music Guide for years, but haven't heard a single note of the Amsterdam-based quartet's music until now. Thanks to the largesse of the British/Dutch group's American publicist, I was able to catch a set by the long-running underground icon on its U.S. tour supporting its latest album The Whispering Wall. In front of a small but adoring crowd (the ladies dressed in tasteful Goth regalia, as befits the club that is Austin's home for Goth, while the gentlemen settled for jeans and t-shirts, everyone but me intimately familiar with the music), the Dots played a generous hour-and-15-minute set, plus two encores, of their genre-defying sonics. There are lots of familiar elements to the LPD sound; singer/leader Edward Ka-Spel, keyboardist/electronicist/co-founder Silver Man, longtime saxophonist Niels Van Hoornblower and new guitarist Erik Drost happily gene-splice electronic music, psychedelic rock, found sound sampling, Gothic rock and even pop into a hybrid that sounds like no one else. The music ebbed and flowed, sometimes so sedate it forced the crowd into a hush, often louder than one might expect from a band with no live rhythm section. Van Hoornblower usually blew tasteful, effortlessly melodic lines from his saxes, but was quite capable of bawling fiercely; Silver Man often employed various electronic theremin like devices when he wasn't slapping his synth or programming the next rhythm loop. Drost added clean arpeggios and the occasional raucous solo, but, frankly, seemed superfluous to many of the songs; when he had something to do, he did it well, but too often he seemed to be struggling to find a place where his Gibson wouldn't get in the way. It almost didn't matter, though, as Ka-Spel was the focus from the moment he walked out on stage. Despite having a stage presence so languid he seemed incapable rather than unwilling of moving around much (or speaking to the audience, for that matter), once he gently grasped the mic it was impossible to take your eyes off him. His charismatic, very British singing, so much like that of Robyn Hitchcock or Syd Barrett, rode the top of whatever smooth wave or throbbing chaos the musicians produced like an expert surfer. The set started off a bit too slowly and quietly, and the Dots' dependence on pre-programmed rhythm tracks hindered its momentum somewhat, but at its best the band was mesmerizing, coming off like Roxy Music on really strong acid. Since I'm so unfamiliar with its body of work, the only songs I recognized were tunes from The Whispering Wall: such as "Soft Toy," the superlative acid pop tune that opens the record, the quietly romantic "In Sickness and in Health," the soaring "For Sale," the circus music-laced "Dominic," the bizarre, blackly humorous spoken-word piece "The Divide." The crowd seemed pleased with the song selection, though, even if requests were met with a polite but firm "no." But a group with this many albums (there were at least 20, plus side projects and ephemera, for sale at the merch table) can only play so many tunes without staying on-stage for four hours, so I would imagine only the most churlish fan would complain. I'm certainly not, and though my vast unfamiliarity with the Dots' work kept me from enjoying the show quite as much as I would have liked, I definitely want to check out more of this legendary band. Michael Toland