Crystal Castles-”Coutship Dating”

@ the Commodore Ballroom, Vancouver BC June 4

Crystal Castles gave a blistering electronic performance that meshed together their digital eccentricities and powerful rhythms, producing an overwhelmingly cathartic, organic flux of a dancing crowd surrendering to their wall of sound.

The duo’s name originates after a sky fortress from the Mattel toy series called She-Ra, who was the twin sister of He-Man. The ferocity of vocalist Alice Glass’ raw, borderline-animal screams came across as borderline mythical during their rendition of “Courtship Dating,” giving her supernatural qualities.

The show kicked off with an energetic, strobe-light saturated debut, as Glass slinked onstage and adopted an intimidating, huge stage presence wearing a tube skirt and black button-up top, her eyes thick with black makeup, her trademark jet black bob throbbing to the basslines. She pushed everyone to the brink of epilepsy as she picked up the strobe light, flashed it in the faces of the entire front row as she screamed overtop the myriad of Nintendo sound loops.

Multi-instrumentalist Ethan Kath showed off his versatile musicmanship by flaunting his seamless transitions from turntable to synth, with a machine-like exactness, entrenched in the shadows of the stage in his hoodie like some kind of electric Darth Vader.

The most unique thing about Crystal Castles is their talent to create heat, chaos — all the elements of a natural disaster — without burning up in it themselves. Things got a little stagnant when Glass stepped off the stage for about 10 minutes while Kath entreated the crowd to some of the instrumental montages such as “Magic Spells.” When Glass returned, she was smoking a cigarette that she then tossed into the crowd before throwing herself to surf in it.

 Their experimental, new-wave style of electronic music was particularly good during their performance of “Xxzxcuzx Me,” with the image of Kath pounding demonically on his synth while Glass jumped around the stage like a raging lunatic you didn’t want to stare directly at. Crystal Castles is uniquely aggressive, confrontational, and stylish to the point of viewer anxiety: and certainly isn’t for the faint at heart.

Just been introduced to Crystal Castles, out of Toronto.  Sound has a lot of chopped up vocals, heavy synths, samples and the odd game boy chirp over heavy bass lines!

Vanished

Courtship Dating

Get the album

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crystal_Castles_(band)

http://www.myspace.com/crystalcastles

Every rapper wants to be ‘different’ now. Swizz Beatz and Jim Jones are two of the latest examples, making their own versions of staples from M.I.A. and MGMT.

Swizz Beatz – “I’m Supposed To Ball”

Jim Jones – “Electric Feel”

I’d be more comfortable with rappers doing this if they ever did the original record justice. I just hope dudes don’t start spitting over Crystal Castles (50’s use of “Courtship Dating” withheld). I’ve already written to “Vanished.” No biters allowed. Coincidentally, the music video for that track dropped today.

no. not really, but what’s more better than… listening to CRYSTAL CASTLES?                                                            pretty much one of my favorite bands right now, enjoy this video:

Crystal Castles es un dúo canadiense que comenzó haciendo remixes de canciones conocidas. Con únicamente una batería y un sintetizador,  Alice y Claudio (que yo creo que es un nombre muy bonito), hacen unas melodías excelentes. Realmente no soy fanática de este tipo de música, nunca me han gustado los sonidos repetitivos, ni el hecho de que no se puedan cantar, pero ellos me convencen.

Les dejo una canción que pueden checar en el reproductor de la derecha.

First up in the ‘Crystal’ band category is the Long Beach, CA based group, Crystal Antlers, whose hard core psyche rock sound certainly puts my preconceived notion of all ‘Crystal’ bands as Indie Pop rockers to shame. The indie rock music world has been buzzing about their self-released, eponymous EP. The band has received many comparisons to Les Savy Fay. Check out the featured track, A Thousand Eyes.

Crystal Castles, however, falls squarely into my 80s synthpop stereotype. This Toronto-based group is all synthesizers and drum machines . Their self-titled debut album is a bits and bytes bump and grind fest. Featured track, Courtship Dating.

Get this album free via eMusic’s 50 Free MP3 Promo

buy it at insound!

No son novedad, ya que hace tiempo que
suenan por todos los sitios, y este sábado sonarán
en el Errota,  yo sólo quiero veros bailar,
lo mejor de los fines de semana es bailar,
así que ya sabéis.
Glutton + Chanin sábado 14 Errota.

Track Listing:
1. Untrust Us
2. Alice Practice
3. Crimewave
4. Magic Spells
5. Xxzxcuzx Me
6. Air War
7. Courtship Dating
8. Good Time
9. 1991
10. Vanished
11. Knights
12. Love And Caring
13. Through The Hosiery
14. Reckless
15. Black Panther
16. Tell Me What To Swallow

I don’t know about this stuff. I like it. But this is class-A Neon. Neons are the type of people that dance around to Dan Deacon in loudly colored clothing. Neons are a class of hipsters that differ in music and in clothing choice but are still considered a hipster. Okay, so if and when Crystal Castles starts to being played on repeat in the dark rooms lit up by these neon-derthals, who else will be joining in on the chorus? You? Me? The nerdsss?

Crystal Castle’s self-tilted album was released off of Last Gang Records. Where did Last Gang come from? How did they come about releasing this addictive electronic 8-bit crack? Well apparently, if they were known, that’s exactly what these Canadians are known for. Their roster includes: Metric, Death From Above 1979, MSTRKRFT, Boys Noize, The New Pornographers and Chromeo. Pshtt news to me!

But this stuff goes beyond their usual audience of Neons. Obviously, Crystal Castles is all about electronic, Atari-inspired beats, but has other elements that indie lovers may still find infectious.

“Courtship Dating” sounds like a Timbaland beat with Blonde Redhead playing over. Or how about “Air War”,their “leaked” single? That’s pretty hot too. What about “xxzxcuzx me”? This loud, high-energy, slightly obnoxious song is another one that gets tops. Overall the album is an intricate 1991 Nintendo soundtrack. If 8-bit crack doesn’t ring any bells, think about it like Ratatat with lyrics or a calmer, but still catchy Justice. But still 8-bit enough not to be entirely annoying to scare off the nerds.

Definitely check out of the tracks, pick a favorite or something.
Crystal Castles: Courtship Dating
Crystal Castles: Air War
Crystal Castles: xxzxcuzx me