Over The Top Diary #2

We sent writer Pras Rajagopalan to cover last week's Over The Top Festival in Toronto. Here is his coverage of Friday and Saturday's action at the fifth edition of the event...

Friday
It's Friday, and I am woefully groggy. I can count on one hand the hours of sleep I've had during the past three nights. Undeterred, I soldier on to the Music Gallery for more Over The Top fun.

The Music Gallery

The Nihilist Spasm Band originally formed in 1965 as a kazoo band who accessorized with noise makers on their way to becoming the granddaddies of the noise genre as we know it. I wasn't really sure what to expect on this night, but I was greatly heartened to see Bill Exley, a robust middle-aged gentleman with a booming, Gandalf-esque voice reading bile-soaked poetry over an improvised din of noise makers, homemade instruments (amongst them, a "Pratt-a-varius"), guitars, bass and kazoos. At first the set was relatively structured, with the pounding drum work of percussionist Aya Onishi providing a sturdy backbone for the band's fluctuating noise dynamics. As it progressed, things got a little more improvisational, but the band's energy was impossible to escape. Melodramatic, loud, and never dull, this was a show I won't soon forget.

Sneaky Dee's
Over at Sneaky Dee's, I arrived just in time to catch Kid 606, who took the stage to a half-full venue. As the set progressed, the audience had swelled noticeably, although judging by many of the awkward white-boy dance moves on display, this was a group more familiar with guitars and choruses than with laptops and samples. Still, the electronic whiz turned in an energetic, if detachedly professional performance. There appeared to be somewhat of a disconnect with the audience, who required frequent coaxing by Kid 606 to get moving, albeit somewhat politely, to his frenzied beats. He did put forward a workmanlike effort, but not enough of one to make me want to bust a move.

Saturday

The Drake Hotel (matinee)
I finally caught up on some much needed sleep, rising only an hour before the matinee show at the Drake. I nonetheless managed to make it in time for the Fembots, who performed their industrial-folk songs as a two-piece. Hushed and low-key, the Fembots played a set of understated, dark songs that channelled a scuffed rural spirit crying out in the isolation of an urban bedroom. A quick mid-set stroll and a delicious cinnamon bun later, I descended to the Drake's basement to behold Owen, the one-man band that is Mike Kinsella, onetime member of Cap'n Jazz and Owls. His set could be summed up in one word: conversation. Frequently he engaged in lengthy conversations with a devoted audience of punk and emo kids. Topics for discussion included Kinsella's favourite sandwich, favourite Smiths record and the recruitment of one of his songs in the Ashlee Simpson show. The set mutated into a charmingly intimate, funny and candid Q & A session punctuated by his equally candid songs. These are songs that sound like phone conversations you're not supposed to hear — drunken confessionals and angry confrontations delivered with spoonfuls of acoustic finger-picked sugar. Owen dispenses with most abstractions and metaphors, keeping the songs nakedly honest. I was won over by Owen's raw, smart sincerity. Feeling buoyant, I bounced home to cold pasta leftovers and proceeded to the Music Gallery.

The Music Gallery

Arriving midway through Hamilton one-man band Mayor McCa's set, I was pleased to see that the man looked just as haggard as I hoped someone with his name would. Bearded and tousled, he played a thoroughly entertaining set of ragged rock and casio-synth tunes, rounded out by a bass drum, guitar and a system of pedals simulating a bass. Let's not forget, of course, the mid-set tap dancing. In keeping with the diverse nature of this festival, Mayor McCa was succeeded by the art/experimental folk pop of The Dirty Projectors. The Dirty Projectors may not be the most accessible band — they eschew many of rock's traditional melody patterns in favour of classical, folk and even jazz influences. Yet they played a mesmerizing set, combining nimble guitar work and alien song structures into a wonderfully strange, eerie listening experience. Vocalist Dave Longstreth's peerless voice was a bewildering tour de force, all hiccuping inflections and falsettos, vaguely similiar to Bjork and, perhaps, Jeff Buckley. An impromptu encore, consisting of a folk song featuring Longstreth sans mic, was received amid pin drop silence and was hair-raisingly beautiful. In fact, headliner Chad Van Gaalen was easily eclipsed by the Projectors.

Sneaky Dee's

I jogged up to Sneaky Dee's for a performance by New York shoegaze pop quartet Asobi Seksu, who have been the recipients of all kinds of press buzz. Their vocalist sang sweetly enough and the band rocked hard enough. What left me feeling a little cold, though, is how predictable the lilting vocals and Nutrasweet organ verses became, especially as they morphed into a wall of distortion-heavy guitars and frenzied drumming. Replete with strobe lights, a vocal-heavy mix and coquettish Asian frontwoman who occasionally sings in Japanese, Asobi Seksu might have managed to make shoegazing music relatively marketable, at least amongst the MySpace and OC followers. Growing a little weary of their epic blaze-of-glory outros, I headed down to The Boat to get my rawk on with Brantford, Ontario's The Sourkeys.

And so ended my Over The Top Fest adventure. The fest should be lauded for not only booking a diverse range of artists, but also for making these shows accessible to people of all ages. I cannot say I liked all of the acts, but there were a couple that were permanently etched into my memory.