Defocused Temporal Perception

MSTRKRFT, one of the more prominent Canadian electro-house DJs fronted with Steve Aoki hit the Commodore Ballroom last night with a five hour set of “four-to-the-floor” electro base.  Great right?  I mean these guys have some pretty sweet tracks.

Mr. Steve Aoki on the big screen.

Well, actually not so much. I was really disappointed with most of the night.  The show consisted of five hours of what I can only describe as four-to-the-floor musical default.  This kind of stuff is supposed to be used so you can transition your way from one song to another, it certainly isn’t the main course or the reason I showed up.  None the less the crowd seemed to make due, even without anything good to dance to.  It was a pretty good crowd out and as such there was plenty of jumping, grinding, screaming and general debauchery which is key to a good concert.  However, I can’t help that feel that more than a few of my fellow patron left feeling pretty disappointed.

MSTRKRFT at the Commodore Ballroom

What makes this so upsetting is the fact that both of these artists are generally pretty talented. In the studio at least, their music is full of the standard things that make good music good, Melody, Rhythm, Chord Progressions, etc.  A quick listen to both the Steve Aoki and MSTRKRFT mySpace pages could suggest that at least ‘on paper’ this should have been a fantastic evening.  For example, some of the key tracks missing from the place were Mr. Aoki’s “HAUS OF CARDS [sic]” or the KRFT’s “Work on You” both arguably some of their best hits.

I was really expecting something a lot better.  I’m looking forward to Deadmau5’s upcoming performance at the UBC Thunderbird Arena October 2nd to bring the heat.