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As I understand it, the Skybar doesn't generally have live music on Mondays, but Fluttr got them to agree to let them have an open rehearsal, so they could try out some new stuff in front of an audience, and Specimen 37, who're experimenting with video projection during their set, got onto the "bill" so they could practice loading into a club and setting up in a non-demanding setting. And I've never seen either band, and it's free. So....
Fluttr are very cool. I've never seen an electronic marimba before! There's no bass, but there's a stripped-down electric cello. Also guitar, drums, and a talented singer with fantastic, engaging stage presence. (She keeps reminding me of Amanda Palmer a bit.) The music at first seems a bit gothy to me, but it's more rock than that, and more complicated. They do a couple of brand new songs and beg us to be gentle with them, but they come off very smoothly and sound great. The drummer is actually perfect on the hard stuff, and drags a bit on the more straightforward parts. (Just stick with the hard stuff!) They cover "Frame by Frame," and it takes cojones to cover King Crimson. The guitar and marimba duetting on that one is fantastic. The also play a few favorite requests from their loving fans in the audience, but I actually like the new ones better.
Specimen 37 (or, actually, their people) kind of flail around for a while trying to get their video projection setup to work, which was, after all, the point. Eventually they start, with their keyboard player setting something going and then taking to the front of the stage to harangue us in a Residents-y fashion. There's a lot of that kind of weird, elliptical poetry in their vocals, while the music is a bizarre mix of metal and electronica, with virtuoso drumming that speeds up, slows down, and jumps around in a way that I find very disturbing, but seems entirely deliberate. It manages to be cool just by having so much going on. This leaves me wondering about the projections; do they really need more going on here? Then a couple of the songs late in the set get bogged down in aimless jam-band noodling, and the projections provide a nice focus for my attention while I'm bored with the music. Overall, I find this band fascinating, and I wonder if they've ever run one of those gig classifieds: "Influences include Sabbath, the Dead, and the Residents."
