[photo by nyctaper]
In the final days of the great Death By Audio, the appearance of Woods as a special guest on Thursday was appropriate on so many levels. Of all the accomplished DIY bands of Brooklyn in the aughts, Woods perhaps best epitomized the ability to both stay true to your roots while evolving as a band. In short, they’ve managed to grow in their abilities and their popularity without selling out. The same can be said for Death By Audio, a venue that perfected a very workman-like authentic DIY aesthetic — consistently booking local and out of town touring bands while mixing in the occasional huge show. The special feature of this show was that Woods were reunited with founding member G. Lucas Crane, who parted ways with the group a few years ago to pursue his solo projects and also to concentrate on his work as one of the primary forces behind the Silent Barn. Lucas performed a brief solo set, mixing his special cassettes in a soundscape that segued nicely into the opening of the Woods set as the band joined him onstage in a seamless transition into an epic 15-minute “Bend Beyond”. We’ve seen several mindbending versions of this song over the years, but this take on ‘Beyond’ was truly remarkable as the band pushed the boundaries of the song through several jam sequences undoubtedly motivated by the historical nature of the occasion. We are streaming it below.
When ‘Beyond’ ended and Lucas left the stage, one would think that there would have been a little letdown, but this was clearly not the case. Woods was on a mission — whether it be welcoming old friend Alex Bleeker on “Cali In A Cup”, or dedicating “It Ain’t Easy” to the late Brooklyn musician and band friend Jamie Ewing, breaking out old material (“Rain On”), or multiple mentions and thanks to Edan and Death By Audio. This is a band who knows from whence they came and returned to old haunts to pay tribute in the best way possible, by playing a show that is perhaps the best night we’ve had all year. The capacity crowd seemed to feel that same way as they simply would not let the band leave despite equipment problems. When Edan located a spare drum pedal all was fixed and the show went on. The first of two encores was the band’s superb take on the Pink Floyd classic “Green Is The Colour”, a recent nyctaper recording of which ended up on a split single of Woods and MV+EE takes on the song on Piccadilly Records. The show ended with another of the band’s anthems, “Be All Be Easy”, which we are also streaming below.
I recorded this set with the Sennheiser cards on a small stand in the front and center of the stage and mixed the on-stage sound with an excellent soundboard mix provided by DBA’s Edan. The mix combines primarily vocals and drums from the board complimenting the clear guitar and bass from the stage. The sound quality is simply stunning. Enjoy!
Stream “Bend Beyond”:
Stream “Be All Be Easy”:
Download the Complete Show [MP3] / [FLAC]
Note: All of the material on this site is offered with artist permission, free to fans, at our expense. The only thing we ask is that you download the material directly from this site, rather than re-posting the direct links or the files on other sites without our permission. Please respect our request, and feel free to repost the Soundcloud links.
Woods
2014-11-06
Death By Audio
Brooklyn NY
Digital Master Recording
Soundboard + On-Stage Audience Matrix
Soundboard [engineer Edan] + Sennheiser MKH-8040s > Edirol R-44 (Oade Concert Mod) > 2 x 24bit 48kHz wav files > Soundforge (level adjustments, mixdown, set fades) > CDWave 1.95 (tracking) > TLH > flac (320 MP3 and tagging via Foobar)
Recorded and Produced
by nyctaper
Setlist:
[Total Time 1:04:28]
01 Bend Beyond
02 Leaves Like Glass
03 Cali In A Cup
04 Shining
05 Jam
06 Size Meets The Sound
07 Is It Honest
08 It Ain’t Easy
09 Shepherd
10 Rain On
11 With Light and With Love
12 [encore break]
13 Green is the Colour [Pink Floyd]
14 Be All Be Easy
If you download this recording from NYCTaper PLEASE SUPPORT Woods, visit their website, and purchase With Light and with Love from the Woodsist Records website [HERE].
It really doesn’t get any better than this. Thank you.