- Touring in support of their new album Whorl, Simian Mobile Disco hit Chicago on a recent Tuesday night for a live set at Lincoln Hall. The usually indie rock-focused venue checked all the right boxes. With a total capacity of around 500, its two-story music room is shallow but wide, and boasts an excellent d&b audiotechnik soundsystem. The cozy bar in the front has a decent beer selection and good food, should one want a bite to eat during the show.
This night started with an opening set from Cleveland's James Donadio, AKA Prostitutes. I'm a fan of Donadio's blistered, experimental productions, but his live set was a disappointing tease. It started slow and brooding, with stony drums and tense, chopped-up vocal loops, and soon pushed into faster, more frantic rhythms. Among the 15 or so people on the floor, head-nodding increased and more bodies began to move—and then Donadio finished abruptly, a little over 20 minutes into the allotted 45-minute slot, causing an awkward silence before set-break music was turned back on. I know some artists prefer shorter sets, but to keep it that short on that soundsystem seemed baffling.
Nearly an hour later, James Ford and Jas Shaw appeared onstage between a table covered in hardware and a projection screen for Whorl-themed visuals. With a much larger crowd now filling the floor, the duo spent the next 70 minutes crafting a well-paced set that was more concert performance than dance party. They moved between bouts of synth-heavy 4/4 techno (hinting at their brash earlier work) and spacious soundscapes, and the crowd was receptive throughout. From the new album, I heard the vaguely Radiohead-esque "Nazard" early on, and later "Dervish" and "Jam Side Up." "Casiopeia"'s romantic stirrings near the end were too intensely overdriven, and some of the eclecticism and nuance that separates Whorl from the rest of the SMD catalog felt a bit missing. Delivered through crystal-clear speakers, though, it was easy to be drawn in by the duo's confidently wide-ranging performance.