Apollo Heights, Dengue Fever and Rachid Taha at Central Park Summerstage, NYC 7/5/08

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Apollo Heights, Dengue Fever and Rachid Taha at Central Park Summerstage, NYC 7/5/08 

 

 

A good psychedelic triple bill spanning three eras out of sequence. Self-described “sonic slayers” Apollo Heights opened the show. The band makes excellent recordings, and from the first few screams of feedback and the wall of reverb-drenched overtones emanating from the Brooklyn noise-rock band’s three guitars, the sound was as hypnotic as it was bracingly abrasive. In an ironic tip of the hat to Screaming Jay Hawkins, their cd is called White Music for Black People. Sample song title: Everlasting Gobstopper, which pretty much explains what they’re about. Lyrics and vocals are not this band’s primary focus. It was apparent from the git-go that the band had drums on tape, which was too bad because a good drummer would add a whole new dimension to this unit. But perhaps they like to keep their beats minimal and sleepy. Sadly, later on in the show, a closer listen and then a look to see if one of the guitarists was using an octave pedal (nobody was) revealed that there was also bass on tape. Which was lame, the kind of gesture that doesn’t exactly inspire any of the band’s fans to go see them live. The vocals were obviously live, but were they miming the guitars as well? Given the whistling screech produced by the Vox Phantom player’s effects pedals, it didn’t seem like it. But what if they had all that on tape too? As it turned out, they didn’t. But if a rumor that Apollo Heights mime their live shows ever starts circulating over the internet, the band have only themselves to blame.

 

Dengue Fever were next, proving themselves far more interesting than a mere novelty act. Their specialty, and their shtick, is psychedelic Cambodian pop from the 60s and 70s. Just like Chicha Libre, what they’re playing is indigenous music that’s suddenly come into contact with the wildest, craziest side of American psychedelia. To their considerable credit, it was hard to tell their originals from the covers. Their show revealed two types of songs. Their poppier numbers were pretty much indistinguishable from anything you’d hear in a mini-mall in Chinatown, all chirpy, cheery vocals over trebly, peppy melodies in the Asian scale. But their rockers were excellent, sounding like the Electric Prunes serenading the Rangers at some top secret Vietnam-era air base. Often jamming out on a single chord, the songs gave their excellent sax player a chance to cut loose with terse, slowly crescendoing solos, their organist and somewhat surfy guitarist prowling around the top of the scale while their excellent, swaying frontwoman showed off an impressive lower register. Their equally good bassist played with a percussive physicality, punching out chords and bending notes from time to time to give the lows some extra bounce.

 

When Rachid Taha sauntered on to the hypnotically slinky strains of an Egyptian pop melody by his superb six-piece backing band, it was clear that the party had started for him hours before. Chainsmoking and wearing an ear-to-ear smirk, the bad boy of French-Algerian rai-punk rock left no doubt that he was there to bring the party to everybody, and he and the band delivered. Within seconds, the crowd – a remarkable mix of ages and nationalities, notably absent the usual legions of North Africans who know all the words and sing along – was a mass of bouncing, swaying bodies. In just over an hour including a long, trance-inducing one-chord jam that served as their lone encore, Taha and his supporting cast delivered a solid set of material from throughout his career. Driven by screaming electric lead guitar, the first few numbers matched the distorted power of his live cd. They then left the rock behind and played several of his signature Middle Eastern dance hits featuring expansive, colorful leads from both his terrific oud player and his keyboardist, who frequently used a synth setting that imitated the sound of a ney flute. With both a drummer playing a full kit and an energetically virtuosic dumbek (hand drum) player, the dance beat was unstoppable, far superior to the slick drum machine production on a lot of Taha’s recorded work.

 

Throughout the set he made up new lyrics, messing with both his band and the audience. “Do you like techno music? Cocaine? Ecstasy? FFFFFFTTTT?”  he asked sardonically as he introduced his big dancefloor hit Habima, taking a big hit off an imaginary joint.

 

“This is my first song ever in English,” he riffed later, before the band launched into another song. “Je m’en fiche [I don’t care]. Fish and chips? Fish bones? George Fish? Oh, excuse me,” he laughed.

 

On the intro to his big, haunting 90s crossover dance hit Ya Rayyeh, Taha asked if there were any Arabic speakers in the audience. Meeting with only tepid response, he was derisive. “Oh, you fucked up Iraq. Fuck you,” he snarled in French. He then let the oud player and keyboardist sing most of the song while he took a lengthy smoke break.

 

At the end of the show, he and the band came up to the front of the stage, arms around each other. “He’s a Muslim,” Taha said, pointing to one of his bandmates. Then he introduced the others. “He’s Jewish, he’s Catholic, he’s, um, a bassist,” Taha told the crowd, proof that left to their own devices, free from interference from mullahs or politicians, bass players can get along with just about anyone.

 

And a word about the space: Summerstage is back. No more wire-fence holding pens. No more endless security gauntlets (although if you bring a bag, through the main entrance at least, it will be inspected). The main space has been reopened to pretty much the size it was when they first started showing concerts here, and most of the bleachers along the rear perimeter are once again open to the public. And the fence that for a long time kept the outer perimeter at such a distance that it was impossible for those outside the inner arena to hear anything has been removed. Although it still seems like a good idea to show up when the gates open (3 PM) if you’re planning to see a headline act here: by the time Taha took the stage, the space appeared to be filled to absolute capacity.