X Minus Pro Vocal Remover
Perla Hockins
Curiosity began to circulate around this musician, who was busily, quietly working on a debut album that would change electro music for the future. His self titled release featured some of the most exciting, up and coming names in British urban music including Sampha, Little Dragon and Jessie Ware. A brooding, textured and experimental record which pushed boundaries and created new trends all between twelve tracks had critics and fans selling out SBTRKT's tours and shows. The musician often incorporated real musical instrumentals into his live show, along with the synth and artificial sounds used in most of his music, the performance is an ethereal experience of electro dance, often joined by vocalist Sampha.
I found the lead vocalist appealing. His voice was unique but yet something about it was familiar. It was a surrealistic experience. The band wore masks, but their faces weren't completely concealed. I guess I would describe the masks as sort of tribal, like something from Africa. They were pretty and they were interesting to look at. They didn't distract from the music one bit. The guy on keyboards was a pro, just made his contributions appear easy and effortless. The audience was half and half, split. Some arose to dance without inhibitions while the remainder just danced in their seats and bobbed their heads to the beat. I happened to be in the latter just because I attended this particular show by myself and given I had no friends with me I felt a little shy to get up on my own. I kind of regret that though.
I saw SBTRKT way back in early 2012, fresh off of the release of the debut album. They played The Orpheum in Ybor City, and absolutely killed it. The disappointing part about this show was that the crowd was awful and boring, no one wanted to move or dance or have any fun. Didn't stop my friends and I from cutting rug on the floor, and with the way SBTRKT plays a show, I can't imagine doing anything else. SBTRKT plays a lot of moody and mellow music, but when you see him live, it transforms in to a mashed up, bassy mix of uk funky house and just plain dance-y music. Sampha is amazing on vocals and Jerome's live drumming, theremin work, and electronics work are mind boggling to watch and mind pleasing to hear. I've never seen two people effectively manage so much equipment on stage to produce live (rather than mixed) electronic music. To top it off, while Sampha performed live vocals for his parts, what may have even possibly been better was the sampling work done on Little Dragon's vocals in Wildfire or Gabor's voice in Pharoahs. In short, they know how to run a live act and they produce a ton of energy. Amazing show.
The whole set minus the sound quality was impeccable, the light and the animation were just on point. Yet somehow the sound was just bit too empty to filled in a concert rather a night club fun time, it kind impressed me this way, that the artist was trying too hard to deliver something to actually succeed, everything ended up being sorta unfinished.