Tuesday, April 12, 2011
The Spin Oupa w/Porcelain Raft + 'Dick Move' (Justin Townes Earle) Secret Show at The Basement, 4/11/2011
Posted by The Spin on Tue, Apr 12, 2011 at 2:13 PM
Porcelain Raft (one guy) played reverb-soaked ditties with slow tempos punctuated by mildly opiate chord changes, until an exercise in clamorous strumming created a woozy cloud of noise. Frequencies and riffs bounced in all directions like a hive of angry Slinkies. PR’s plain, beautiful voice — in the Thom Yorke tradition — blended well with his one-man band, a production that included guitar, pedals and a drum pad. After a couple of softies, PR began contrasting his mellifluous guitar and vocals with a drum loop and that induced head-nodding. And it sounded good, as audible rain strengthened the overall performance’s salve.
After a back-porch smoke break during which gales blew smoke and embers through random trajectories, Daniel Blumberg, aka Oupa (Yuck’s lead singer), began his set. Similar to PR but more ruminative, androgynous and riddled with falsetto (think Jónsi), Blumberg continued the theme of slow-paced guitar and keyboard ballads played in front of a sparsely populated, intimate audience. We thought we recognized one of the songs as a cover (we just couldn’t put our finger on it — hate that!), and when the soft-talking Brit sheepishly invited us to heckle him, The Spin, after surmising his ilk, were tempted to shout for more covers by “Kate Bush!” or “Tori Amos!” or “Field Mice!” or “The Smiths!” Thankfully, The Spin exercised restraint, and when we approached Blumberg about our suspicion that he had covered a song, he said that yes, he had covered a Porcelain Raft song.
By midnight, The Basement had filled to near-maximum capacity to watch "Dick Move," the incognito moniker for one Mr. Justin Townes Earle. (What other club in Nashville boasts better secret shows than The Basement?) Joined by upright bass and fiddle, the band nailed it (any mistakes went unnoticed by the scotch-served Spin at this point) and left us feeling warm enough to confront the weather after Earle & Co. closed with a ’Mats cover, “Can’t Hardly Wait.”
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