Unhelpful

I went to the first day of the Detroit Electronic Music Festival on Saturday. This series of impressions may not be in any logical order. I got there in the early afternoon, and wandered around without much of a schedule, as I was there to see Autechre playing at nine. In fact, every other band could have been playing ska-bluegrass polka and I’d have waited through it to get a chance to see Autechre.

The music was diverse, including straight ahead hip hop, Detroit’s own 4/4 techno, acid jazz, breakbeat, and of course, trance. My tastes run toward the more industrial electronic (or more accurately, toward actual industrial), and to bands which don’t typify the broad genre of “techno” if they even qualify as it at all - Autechre, Aphex Twin, Boards of Canada, Download, Dead Voices on Air, Not Breathing, and so forth.

I was looking for the fourth stage, and when I find it, there’s some guy doing some freestyle rap, and more interesting to me, following it up with some rather well-worded political commentary.

The shock came when he started using phrases and concepts that sounded like he was preaching my lines to his choir. Particularly about race and class; a lot of what passes for racism is classism in disguise, because this country likes to pretend that class issues don’t exist - that it’s something that only countries with oppressive totalitarian regiemes who wrap themselves up in communist ideology try to stir up. This is utter bullshit. There’s plenty of classism in this country. More to the point, a lot of what gets attributed to racism is classism in disguise. At any rate, it takes guts and integrity to get up on a stage and talk about a truth a lot of people aren’t eager to acknowledge. As I didn’t have a watch with me and came in late in the performance, I didn’t catch who it was.

So after walking around a lot more and wondering exactly when it was that this area became so much more hip than it was when I left it, it approached nine, so I headed back down to make sure I had a great place to be for Autechre’s performance.

Kit Carlson DJd while Autechre were setting up their toys, which turned out to be a good choice, spinning an aggressive, beat-heavy bombastic set devoid of trance-inspired drivel. Trance (not to mention Goa and house) drives me nuts, as you might have guessed, so I surely wasn’t missing it. Autechre came on at nine as the crowds were really starting to pick up, and played a set which could only be described as explosive, and I’m glad I was there to hear it.

For those of you who haven’t seen some of the more abstract electronic bands like Autechre and Not Breathing play, it amounts to what could best be described as free-form composition - they’re not playing songs off an album, they’re literally making it up as they go - and it’s great if it’s pulled off well.

I skipped Sunday, Autechre was the only act on the roster that I actually listen to, but I might check out Monday more for the scene than the specific performers. Which brings me to something else I noticed about the event: the audience.

Typical at most other concerts I’ve been to in the last ten years or so is the mosh scene. If I’m paying $10-45 to see a concert, I don’t go to push some 250 pound childish fat fuck of a bastard back into the mosh pit when he comes flailing his goddamn arms at me. In fact, when I have to do that, it’s time not spent watching the stage which is, in fact, the fucking reason I came. “Oh wow, here we are listening to {heavy metal/hard rock/industrial metal/industrial} and you’re moshing. You’re very cool, welcome to 1988 assnugget.” It was nice to be at an all-day venue like this and not have to deal with any of that. Imagine that, I can actually watch the performance I came to enjoy.

The venue - and the audience - were good at using some of the other spaces available (and there were plenty) to do the sorts of social things where the audience pays attention to itself, be it breaking, tagging the wall (which was set off for just that), or just making a spectacle of oneself.

Food was a little overpriced, as is normal, but not rapaciously so. On top of the fact that the event itself is free, and parking was only $5, it wasn’t so bad. In fact, when I passed the new Comerica Park (the Detroit Tiger’s joint, now we name stadiums after corporations instead of people), the $15-20 parking there set off alarm bells. I was relieved when it got downright reasonable the closer I came to the river.

There were a lot of booths, but aside from several local businesses and radio stations selling their own shirts (and DEMF’s official shirts), there wasn’t a big press to push loads and loads of merchandise, which was something of a switch. There were a lot of people pushing flyers, but at a free concert, that’s not exactly surprising. There’s an invention to take care of that: pockets. Hands in pockets can’t be given ten copies of the same flyer.

The “candy clubber” look and the dancing with glow sticks wasn’t very prevalent, which was a relief to me personally, as I find both to be tacky and rather played-out. The fashion statement in vogue? Big pants.

Really… big… pants.

See you there tomorrow. If I get up in time, that is.

Comments? Sure.