Dead Can Dance 2012 Tour

Remember when the entertainment wasn't nutty dancing but maybe you got a psychadelic tie dye photon spew lightshow at most and the concert was really a concert. What have we wrought that this generation (classic rock) and all those that will follow? Do we really need visual excitment primary and the music secondary. Is this the fault of television, video games, home theater phones with screen, right now as I look at this screen etc?
I actually find it painful to watch lead singers doing virtual acrobatic for our entertainment can't we all just want to hear music.
There is a refuge in classical concerta which I once had season tickets and there was no intrument syncing going on. But classical can be deadly boring at times and the audience is mostly octogenerians.
I think the whole lip sycn scandal by Beyonce at the inaugural may be a good thing and "we the people" demand a live musical concert and simply won't support this crap. As has been said, concerts had some errors and sponteneity, even well known songs sounded different in concert and we thought it was a treat, remember when bands were just jamming for us mostly unrehearsed .

I hope and believe. "We the people" make this rediculous visual entertaiment the show not a concert. We the people can demand real live music or be forwatned that you will be listening to mostly prerecorded music and song I hope iot is not too late to insist on knowing it so you can boycott. Maybe, just maybe, we can hear what pay for..

Lip syncing is one thing.
Paying over a hundred dollars to sit and listen to a playback of the original LP recording you have at home.....is outrageous!?

i got the same impression of lisa when she sang in l.a. they would show closeups of her, and sometimes that voice didnt seem to be coming from her mouth. kinda weird. i didnt want to, and still dont want to believe that she may have been lip syncing.

I feel the same Photon.
The sideways banks of speakers were obviously there to 'mask' the sound of the real drummer and percussionist from those in the first few rows of the audience?

I should have realised earlier when I saw the large iMac monitor on the floor in front of Brendan?

I would have thought DCD would have attracted more than just 2600.

That's the capacity of the Concert Hall. The concert was sold out in a day (5 months ago).....and there's another one tonight.

Argh, your report leaves me queasy and disgruntled. The accelerating dissolution of the divide between performance reality and fiction continues to erode musical culture. I've seen a number of polls lately asking the public how they feel about this lip-sync phenomenon and ever larger numbers seem to feel it makes no difference. As a culture, we first lost the ability to tolerate physical imperfections in the appearance of media stars, expecting every image to be Photoshop perfection. Now, the same hyper-real expectations seem to be poisoning our ability to tolerate the glitches of live musical performance.

I would have thought DCD would have attracted more than just 2600. Maybe Lisa had laryngitis....??

:-)

It’s just passed 11.00pm Sunday night Feb 3rd 2013 and I have returned home from seeing Dead Can Dance performing Anastasis at the Sydney Opera House in front of 2600 people.

The concert began on time without introduction or small talk….with six performers on stage including one drummer and another percussionist as well as two synthesisers.
During the evening, sometimes three synthesisers were employed.
Two banks of speakers hung from the ceiling whilst another two banks of speakers sat on either side of the stage, facing the performers and not the audience.
These were not the standard floor-box speakers often required for the performers to ‘hear’ themselves……but were twelve foot high ‘monsters’ capable of filling the hall with sound?

I was centre stage in the tenth row of stalls and initially I was transfixed at how identical the sound mix matched what I heard on the vinyl release in my living room?
Every nuance was exactly as I knew it….the balance was identical…the ‘mix’ was identical…..the re-verb on the voices….the shimmer of the cymbals…..the depth of the synth-created bass notes.
But what really shook me was the ‘timing’?
The ‘timing’ of every track from Anastasis was a ‘clone’ of the album.
This is normally just not possible in my experience….as small ‘timing’ variations are simply a fact of life from performance to performance.

I was rolling my head and tapping my feet in exact syncopation with (and anticipation of) the musical ‘beat’….just as I do from my listening chair at home.

“How good is my system”….I thought to myself?
This is the closest I have ever come to accepting that I was finally re-creating the ‘live’ sound in my own home?
Strangely though….when they performed a track from their earlier album ‘Into The Labyrinth’….the mix, the balance and the timing were entirely different…and poorer than….the recording I have?

By the first encore….I was becoming uneasy.
Lisa Gerrard was singing back-up into a mike at stage front and then stepping back whilst Brendan Perry sang the lead. Strangely…..as she played the zills (finger cymbals)…..there was no mike when she stepped back, yet they sounded crystal clear and floated effortlessly over the dense instrumental melange filling the hall?
I then watched the drummer and percussionist…and couldn’t really hear their contribution apart from the shimmering cymbals. Yet the shimmering cymbals began either before the percussionist brushed them…or after?….and the under 30 Hz dominant throb was certainly not being produced by the drum?

For the final of three encores….a solo from Lisa….I carefully watched only her lips….and gasped at the subtle (yet visible) slip betwixt sight and sound?

As I walked from the Concert Hall amongst the adoring throng….I felt sickened at the realisation that we had all just paid to gather together to listen to a ‘recording’?

DcD, well I saw them. Beautiful music, no doubt but was not overly impressed. Not saying they did not put on great performance, but it seemed like the He vs She show. One song him, than one song her. 4 encores, really? I dont know, just ok in my books.

5 more days and will be seeing DcD in Budapest Hungary. Really, I wish I was up to snuff on the music, but it is not the first time I actually became a bigger fan post concert (ie...Mastadon...). Let you all know how it goes.

Just scored a sealed copy of the live DCD LP "Toward the Within" in double Lp vinyl. Hard to find but finding it sealed was ridiculous. What a record, what a band. I would love to see them live. If only they would come to Oklahoma.....sigh.....

Hah only US venues did not fill up. What a discrace!

Wonder how the crowd will look when i go see them in Budapest Hungary next month. Why do I get the feeling they will not quite look the same. All european tours are sold out except Russia and Hungary. Guess I am going to Hungary.

Went to Beacon Theater in NYC. Enjoyed a lot and lots of good looking women in vampire makeups and ghost dresses. Somewhere around seats there was a smell of perfect Skunk Weed that you can't hide the smell of no matter how hard you try unless you vacuum seal it.

Bad thing that filming was not allowed and I was almost thrown out from the concert.
The 'watch dog' was doin' his job perfect (arf!arf!arf!) interrupting surrounding spectators in the middle of the song to pull me out so I show my video is being deleted and giving me last warning to pull me out of concert permanently (arf!arf!arf!wrrrrr!). The true fact that vast majority of artists would NEVER mind getting filmed and tubed for their own advertisement.

was she good looking?

If you like spooky, then yeah, I guess so

I was also surprised to see the goth scene still going strong after all these years. There were quite a few fans dressed in their sartorial splendor.

I saw them 2 years ago in Maryland. I was amazed to see the diversity in the audience. Of course there were plenty of old fat guys like me (undoubtedly audiophiles), but even more people of varying ages in Goth dress. The guy sitting next to me was in his late 30's (I estimate) in full Goth attire, and tattoos on every inch of his body (that was showing), and dozens of ear/nose rings. There were also a number of young college kids - fairly straight laced looking.

was she good looking?

No, I would have loved to seen that. I did see lots of black lace though - it was like an Addams Family convention.

Thafler-

I was surprised at some of the outfits. Did you happen to see the woman in black lace with the horns in her hair?

Beacon Theatre in NYC is great, but Radio City where I've seen them 10 years ago is simply the BEST.

Doctor M-
good to hear from you! Hope all is well.

Harris4crna-
I am partial to "The Serpent's Egg", and a live set "Toward the Within". "Into the Labyrinth" is probably one of the more popular with audiophiles as the song "Yunlinga" has become a staple demo track.

Their current tour has been opening with two tracks from the new lp and then some older material. If you have the ability (as we did) to see them in an environment that has great acoustics, they are taking great pride and effort in getting the live sound really dialed in. A very surreal two hours.

I attended the show at the Kimmel Center and agree with Slipknot1. They are definitely a band that deliver the goods live. I was also surprised to see the goth scene still going strong after all these years. There were quite a few fans dressed in their sartorial splendor.

Glad to read your still lovin it.

Funny, i was just talking about Dead Can Dance to my Gf. Mentioned to her they will be playing or played in Washington DC. Would love to go see them. Just getting into them. I listen to them on Pandora every night as I go to bed. Which album do you recommend from them?

I'll see them in NYC 8/30 CAN'T WAIT!