Most bands’ press blurbs are pretty uniform—artist from cultural mecca/backwater is making waves in and/or shaking up the boring/over-saturated old scene with their honest/unique/original brand of music. It gets to the point where you can even collect a few and play bingo with them. Thankfully however, Bassnectar’s bio would kill your chances at winning faster than Northern Iowa, even with a free space. I hate to be cliche, but they’re just so damn unusual.
A self-described “multi-faceted, multi-faced creature”, Bassnectar is an updated version of the collective organization that fellow San Franciscans the Grateful Dead cultivated during their heyday. While Lorin Ashton may act as the group’s public face, in addition to manning the decks, he tours with a small army of collaborators, including Videolicious (who is, surprisingly enough, in charge of providing on-the-fly visuals) and trip-hop/downtempo artist DJ Vadim, who hails all the way from St. Petersburg. Bassnectar also tours with its own soundsystem, which is able to pump out enough low frequency untz to overload the mics on every single Youtube video I was able to find.
As for the music, Bassnectar’s recent output, including the excellent Cozza Frenzy and just-released Timestretch EP sits somewhere between DJ Shadow-style hip-hop and a strain of dubstep that wouldn’t be entirely out of place at Cowboy Monkey on a Friday night, ultimately coming out as a stew of snare breaks, melodic vocal lines and a bass sound that continually threatens to wobble completely out of control. Speaking of dubstep, 217Mafia kingpin and Massacre mainstay Mertz will be kicking the evening off to what will likely be one of his biggest crowds to date.
Put simply, Bassnectar don’t go about being a band like everyone else does. Nonetheless, expect movement, potential fistpumping, a fantastic light show, and a lot of bass. Check out a recent track below for a taste of what you’ll hear tonight, and bring your dancing shoes.
Bassnectar – Magical World (feat. Nelly Furtado)
Bassnectar, DJ Vadim and DJ Mertz perform tonight at the Canopy Club. Doors open at 8 p.m. and tickets are $17 in advance.