Zoe Keating

[music | Aphex Twin - Windowlicker]

Last Friday we saw Zoe Keating open for Imogen Heap at the Paradise. We had seen Rasputina last October and were really looking forward to seeing Zoe do her own stuff. She basically plays a couple bars, loops it, then plays over it, loops that, until she has a really impressive sounding full composition. It was crazy to watch her do that live from 8 feet away. One guy and his girlfriend next to us couldn't believe how good she was and that they'd never heard of it before. It was cool to see people get turned on to something different for the first time. I heard lots of comments from people around us to that effect.

As for Imogen Heap, she wasn't really our thing. She seemed talented enough, keyboard + vocals over programmed iBook. I kept being drawn back to "here's a DJ, singing at me", but the audience loved it, and it was decent music.

We ended up leaving after about 5 songs into her set to try and get the train before the "rush". However, what we ended up doing was leaving the club and walking right into the crowd leaving from the UMass hockey game right next door. I think their crowd was a lot bigger than our crowd.

Speaking of the whole "Cellopunk" thing which seems to be bubbling up, I also happened upon Unwoman a couple months ago and bought her CDs, very different stuff from this, but also very good.