[photo courtesy of Melissa Neira]
On Sunday night at Bowery Ballroom, Atlas Sound performed damned near the perfect concert. This was a performer of immense talents playing nearly two hours of superb music — much of it from his acclaimed new album — at the City’s best sounding venue. We make no secret of our admiration for Bradford Cox on this site, but this was Bradford at a level of excellence that we had not previously witnessed. Over the last two years, we’ve seen the development of the Parallax material in a live setting, from the Bell House in early 2010 to St. Cecelia’s Church last Summer. But what elevated this Bowery show above the rest was not just the final polish on a finished and released album, but the near flawless level of proficiency with which Bradford performed. The Parallax numbers (nine of the twelve songs were played) were stretched out and allowed to breath, while Bradford developed looping tracks that were faithful to the album’s theme. For instance, the title track which times at less than three minutes on the album, spanned over seven minutes live — a purposeful and focused seven minutes. The song transitions were natural and did not sound awkward or forced at all, and even in the few tracks where he did not loop, Bradford sounded confident and comfortable. “Mona Lisa”, which is arguably the most “pop” track on the album became a sweet optimistic folk song live, and we are streaming it below. We would have been satisfied with the 75 minutes of the main set, but he returned and played over thirty minutes of encore material, which included two extended songs to end the set. With what Bradford had just given the audience, a little bit of indulgence was not only acceptable, but welcome.
I recorded this set from our standard balcony position at this venue with the four microphone rig and the sound quality is quite excellent. Enjoy!
Stream “Mona Lisa”:
[audio:https://www.nyctaper.com/D9090Deerhunter8282/08.%20Mona%20Lisa.mp3]
Direct download of complete show in MP3 files (HERE)
Download the Complete show in FLAC [HERE].
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.
Atlas Sound
2011-12-18
Bowery Ballroom
New York, NY USA
Four-Track Digital Master Recording
Recorded from Balcony Rail
Neumann KM-150s + DPA 4021’s > Edirol R-44 (Oade Concert Mod) > 2x 24bit 48kHz wav files > Soundforge (level adjustments, EQ, mixdown, set fades) > CDWave 1.95 (tracking) > TLH > flac (320 MP3 and Tagging via Foobar)
Recorded and Produced
by nyctaper
2011-12-19
Setlist:
[Total Time 1:45:04]
01 Parallax
02 The Shakes
03 Te Amo
04 Walkabout
05 Amplifiers
06 Recent Bedroom
07 Modern Aquatic Nightsongs
08 Mona Lisa
09 Angel Is Broken
10 Terra Incognita
11 Nite Bike
12 [encore break]
13 Artificial Snow
14 Flagstaff
15 Attic Lights
If you email nyctaper for access to this recording, we expect that you will PLEASE SUPPORT Atlas Sound, visit the Atlas Sound artist page, and purchase the new album Parallax from 4AD Records [HERE].
Fucking. Brilliant. Thank you, Dan!
Thanks!
huge thank you. BC is unreal.
Thanks–for this one and all the other great posts!
Thanks for getting this up so quickly. It was a beautiful show.
Just brilliant.
Thanks a lot!!! :))))