Recently, Haviland took me to see Tune-yards (sorry, I won't do all that wacky styling of their name) at my favorite theatre in LA, The Fonda. Opening was a North Carolina duo whose album had only been released a few weeks beforehand. By the end of their 45 minute set, Amelia Meath and Nick Sanborn of Sylvan Esso, had become one of my new favorite bands. I went home and bought that album immediately.
Electronic duos can have some trouble when it comes to creating a visually interesting presence on stage, but Nick and Amelia were having so much fun with each other, they succeeded in ways a lot of electronic groups don't. Maybe that's because they both have pretty extensive performance backgrounds in non-electronic music. Amelia was an accapela folk singer in a group called Mountain Man-- and that vocal background brings a nice rich folksy texture to Sylvan Esso stuff. Nick, meanwhile, was the bass player in another band I love, Megafaun.
The past fews weeks have been a crazy flurry of rushing from place to place, but I'm glad I've had this soundtrack to keep me happy. Favorites include "Coffee" (below), "HSKT" "Play It Right" and especially "Could I Be."
I had originally planned this post for last week, then Monday, then Tuesday, then yesterday. I was grouchy for being so busy, but now I'm glad I held off until today so I could also link you to this great NPR full concert from Washington, DC.
They're getting nearly universal praise and I can see why. Sylvan Esso, you are officially my flavor of June--- and perhaps a lot, lot longer.
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