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I feel like I’m going to be doing a huge disservice to Peelander Z while trying to write about them. It’s truly one of those “you had to be there” concert experiences. Previously when people would tell me about their shows, it would start off weird and then get into improbable and the after action reports of the antics would build until as a listener, I would nod saying “un huh, un huh, that sounds wild” while not really paying attention anymore, because I was certainly convinced that the person was just fucking with me.

This past Saturday was the Yo-Yo Open, an exhibition and contest that aims to advance the sport of Yo-Yo in the eyes of the public. As a child of the 80s, I’m familiar with the advertisements for Duncan showing kids pulling tricks like Walk the Dog, around the world and other now primitive, if not quaint, feats. I was prepared to learn and see some people do some impressive tricks, but I don’t think I was really prepared for what I experienced.

I’m really ignorant about most of what I saw, but it looked like people playing really elaborate games of cat’s cradle with themselves in more and more elaborate configurations. My camera was far to slow to capture any of the movement and give what the performers were doing any justice. This is a total cop out on my part, but check out stuff by Mark Montgomery, Rei Iwakura, and Hiraku Fujii on YouTube to get a sense of what was happening. While this was very exciting, we were there predominately for the free musical acts, Adam Matta and Peelander Z.

Adam Matta is a vocal percussionist, or in a less accurate, yet more common parlance, a beatboxer. Using his vocal chords, a few effects pedals for looping and an exhaustive knowledge of breakbeat and mental creativity he was able to build layer upon layer to create more than just beatbox routines, but actual songs. What was really impressive was the amount of power he could get behind his kick drum emulation, pushing out enough bass to perfectly replicate how it feels in the audience to have an instrument on stage doing the same thing. Check out his stuff on MySpace, it’s rather quite impressive.

Peelander Z is essentially The Aquabats meets Shonen Knife. Cute simple pop songs with a veneer of punk and a space ton of theatrical aspects and crowd participation, which rather than the feel-good alternative education Dan Deacon style of crowd participation; this is what it would be like to hang out with the cool kids who’ve loaded up on caffeine and too many hours of Sentai shows.

The songs seem to consist of only verses, “TOO MANY MIKE” “WHAT A HEALTH” shouted as fast as possible while Peelander Yellow, the vocalist and guitarist runs around grabbing people to put them on stage, Peelander Red jumps, climbs, runs, and crawls while playing the bass, while Peelander Green keeps time with a huge amount of flair and arm crossovers.

Every aspect of the show seems geared to getting the audience involved. They pulled people onstage to bang on percussion, they showed people how to play the parts to the songs making instant musicians out of random people, had a limbo contest, and at one point pulled everyone named Mike onstage for a group photo. It was wild and anarchic and far more punk than three teenagers sneering through songs aping bands sneering through songs aping bands sneering through songs aping bands.

Do absolutely everything in your power to go see them live if you can.

Category : Show Review