Everything was quiet. Literally, it was a quiet zone in the whole building. Last Saturday (February 7), Malibu and Joanne Robertson were performing at the Dampfzentrale in Bern, and it was the convention of all conventions: the Swiss Nina Protocolers and probably half of HKB.
The thing is, I’m not the biggest of experts on ambient live shows, so this article won’t go into too much detail or try to act as some sort of review. It’s really not. But today, I want to discuss something very important that we shy away from talking about usually. When you’re at a concert what do you even think about? To be honest, that’s what I was thinking – what does everyone have on their mind right now whilst “Illiad” is at its 7th minute. They really can’t all be in trance by the music from the show’s start to its finish, that would be too Nidra-like. To make this more evocative, the concert hall was absolutely dark, with a harsh white strobe light following a strict 180° path across the crowd. I had a horrible migraine, and the music was half soothing, half making it worse (the bass was too strong). Our side of the room started sitting down (we were in the lazy corner) and then most of the front rows followed suit. We got out earlier and had to discuss this pressing subject.
Now, what were you thinking about?
Listener #1: “How loud the bass is.” Listener #1 was observing the people around. She was thinking how much people actually showed up to the venue for the music itself and how much of it was performative. “A guy was mimicking a camera frame with his hands, pointing them at the stage, lol.”
Listener #2: “Nothing.” He wanted to lay down so he did.
Listener #3: “Work.” Before the concert, Listener #3 said he took his laptop to work in the train. We told him that maybe the music would inspire him for that. After the show, he pursues to say he was thinking about the film-related work he needs to get done and how he wanted to take his computer out. He did think about the music inspiration comment and said it kid of helped.
Listener #4: “The strobe light doing a 180°.”
Listener #5: “No comment.” Listener #5 arrived late and rushed in to not miss one more minute of Ms. United In Flame’s show. He did not expand at all on what he thought about the concert overall. Boo.
P.S. We like Malibu, don’t get me wrong.
P.P.S: Also, this question should probably expand into a bigger Coquetas concert investigation.
Bisous L