Saturday, March 15, 2008

A Week of SXSW 2008: Pterodactyl


[March 15]
Pterodactyl
Sounds Like: Avant-Garde/Experimental
Drinking Buddies: Parts & Labor, Blood Brothers, Polvo
Synopsis: Noise rock at it's finest.
Appearances at SXSW:
  • Spiderhouse (New York Night Train) [5:00PM, March 15]
[Myspace]




All this week, Voilà! is covering South By Southwest!
Night of the fourth day, and it's time for the sixth Voilà! featurette.
Tonight, the featured SXSW artist is Pterodactyl.


The whole point that SXSW strives toward is getting people together to listen to great music. But the key is, listening to great NEW music. Bands you haven't heard - bands you might not ever hear unless they played there. It can be a make or break situation for any little band to get big. But SXSW, if you look closely, is our binoculars to the future of music. We get to see a whole slew of bands that haven't made it yet, and judge for ourselves where music is heading. We get to see strange experimentations and interesting sounds.

Then we hear Pterodactyl, which is comprised of strangers from New York, who play a style that doesn't always get a prominent place in musical discussion: noise rock. Noise rock, for those who don't know, is exactly what you might imagine if you heard the phrase. Loud, dissonant, often discontorted, wild, insane, and out of control noise, melodies, sounds, and just about everything else you can imagine, from all directions. The most controlled version of this I know is The Blood Brothers, who adds screaming to the picture for an even more chaotic sound.

Pterodactyl is something like Islands, except with all the parallel universe goatees. They are based primarily in an electronic sort of sound, but instead of forming poppy songs, they form rampant craziness. It's wild and unrestrained, and a lot of fun to listen to if you appreciate all sorts of music.

As of now, Pterodactyl has one LP, their untitled but colloquially named album, Blue Jay, as well as two EPs, I Can See A River, and Friday, During The Day, which are only available in vinyl through mail order or at their shows. And unfortunately, due to complicated circumstances involving a computer, I couldn't post this earlier. Pterodactyl's last SXSW performance was today at 5:00 PM, at the Spiderhouse. Luckily, they are launching a small American tour which will leak into Canada over the next month. Have fun, everyone, on your last big night of music-parties!

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