Deerhoof @ Deaf Institute 29/06/09

It's baking hot and I'm slumped on the couch watching Andy Murray make hard work of beating some eastern european chap. I manage to drag my sweaty self upright and into town as tonight is Deerhoof night.

The San Diego based four piece have fast become one of my favourite bands their inventive and angular guitar music has been a revelation over the past few months on my mp3 player (poor mans ipod) so I'm really looking forward to tonight. Trouble is it's so damn hot I can barely muster the enthusiasm to raise a sweaty fist into the air.

Walking up the stairs at the deaf institute can be an insufferable chore and I often find myself longingly looking at the disabled chair lift and thinking "if only.." but I somehow manage to drag myself up there and hand over my crumpled and slightly damp (it's been in my jeans pocket and its really hot ..ok??) ticket and see the dreaded "SOLD OUT" sign. Which essentially means it's going to be very busy and very warm. What I wasn't expecting though as I stepped into the marvellous Deaf Institute top room was the daylight streaming through the glass ceiling. The normal murky world of pre gig ambling around was now given a spotlight of illumination and I felt suddenly very vunerable I mean ...people can see me. It gives the place a bit of a youth club vibe. Lots of folk just standing around, there's no dark corners for a lonesome gig goer to go and lurk in so I barge my way to the bar and then out onto the terrace for a welcome blast of fresh air.

Finally Punk are the middle band, I've managed to miss the first band because my gig arrival time is now almost perfect. Finally Punk come from Los Angeles they tell us, explaining that they're on tour with Sticks (the first band). They consist of four rather wholesome if slightly kooky looking girls. Their first number is a off kilter yapping punk track and then the singer and guitarist swap places. I'm thinking, throughout the second song, that it's a bit weird to have a non-singer singing your first track but then for the third song they all swap again so the drummer is now singing, bassist on guitar, singer on drums and guitarist on bass...confused?? Well I was especially as it seemed that none of them were really much cop on any instrument! The pattern continues and inbetween every song we're treated to a mini merry-go-round of instruments. I find it painful watching people play guitar when they obviously can't. It's the wrists that get me, the cacky right wrist and the awkward grasp of the plectrum. Strumming a guitar with a hand the shape of an arthritic claw is never gonna sound good. Unfortunately Finally Punk don't either.

I love Jad Fair, I love Half Japanese. I played a show with him once and he's a real swell guy. I've derived much much pleasure from lo-fi bands who hold ideas above musical ability but I don't get this naive rock bullshit anymore. There is no "so bad it's good" in music, I don't follow the Emperors new clothes line (clothes line Arf Arf) at all. What sounds shit, i find, is generally shit. Having said all that I started to spot where perhaps the original line up was. The last few tracks seemed tighter and had a better groove. I noticed the girl who started singing was now on drums and she seemed to be playing a proper beat, the bassist seemed to be able to play without glaring at the neck and to be fair all four of them delivered their post-punk yappy lyrics quite well. Alas, none of them were guitarists. Towards the end of the gig they mention this is their first time in Manchester and how they drove into manchester singing Smiths songs, but they play the "Oh my god we're like so geeky we were singing Smiths songs" card a bit heavy and it's all a bit too Legally Blonde for me.




So the make up of Deerhoof is this...Satomi Matsuzaki is the japanese bassist and married to self taught guitarist John Dieterich, band leader seems to be the affable Greg Saunier on drums and finally the newest member is Ed Rodriguez. That's the back story, I think it's important because there's so much chemistry on stage it's really quite infectious. They start of with a weird choice 'Chatterboxes' which I thought was a bit of a non-event to open up with. In fact, and maybe it's the heat, the first three or four numbers are curiously slow burners. Eventually the gurning from Saunier and Rodriguez's taunting of Satomi finally seem to lure the band into life. Saunier's kit is reduced to a couple of drums and a massive high hat (with plastic bag dampner!) and eventually his long arms and legs begin flailing around.

There's no "O'malley, former Underdog" in tonights set but the brilliant "Spirit Ditties of No Tone" kicks the night up a gear with Satomi dancing her way through songs and occasionally plucking a bass note. She trades the bass with her husband for a song and there's an amusing bit when she spends a few minutes wiping his sweat off her beloved Hofner bass, she then sets about wiping him down, it's cute. Then she's on top of an amp with a whistle singing and acting out a song about a girl who doesn't have enough money to pay the train fare. There's something very Japanese about her (I guess that'd be the being Japanese part) but what I'm thinking is if she acted like this and was English it'd be quite annoying and cutesy whereas it seems cool and cutesy!! Oh those cute crazy Japs eh!! God!!



The biggest cheers of the night come for tracks from the bands last album "Offend Maggie". A brilliant album that is possibly marred by a few too many tracks. But tonight "Tears of Music and Love", "Snoopy Waves" and "Fresh Born" are all fantastic. They make me realise how special they are, there's just something about they way they write songs that's very original and fresh. Plus I think Dieterich and Rodriguez are formidable guitar duo. Satomi requests all the lights to be turned off and then runs back on stage with a day glo mini basket ball and they jerk into "Basketball get your groove back" a bizarre if totally ace track about rabbits and Basketball "Bunny jump Bunny jump Bunny jump" go the lyrics.

Satomi is spinning around and Rodriguez follows suit, the impression that's obvious is that this band love playing and hanging out together.I don't think I've seen a band smile so much on stage. The two of them start following each other around the stage holding their instruments in the air and flying them around the stage like planes. Satomi spins around and accidentally cracks Ed Rodriguez on the back with her bass. He falls on the floor in mock pain and then in slow motion acts out smashing his guitar over Satomis head then it turns into a slow motion guitar smash up session the three of them mockingly throwing guitars at each other even drummer Saunier gets in on the act waving his arms around and then tinkling the cymbal and then ghost hitting it. Had to be their I guess, It was funny if only because you could tell they didn't care, this wasn't rehearsed stage craft this was four loons playing music and having fun on a balmy summers night.

For the ubiquitous encore they swap instruments around and unlike Finally Punk prove that they can all actually play. Drummer Saunier takes lead guitar and vocals for a brilliantly chilled out version of Canned Heats "Going Up The Country". I'm exhausted I want to enthuse more but I'm drained, stick a fork in me!