Day five of CMJ was like mile 20 of a marathon. You’re so close, but it’s the last few miles/hours that seem to drag on when you’re exhausted. Fortunately for me there were some great bands playing to finish the almost weeklong music marathon.
Oberhofer (Brooklyn by way of Tacoma) played The Bowery Presents daytime showcase at Piano’s. The group is a young energetic band, lead by singer/guitarist Brad Oberhofer. This was their ninth performance out of eleven that the band will have played at CMJ, and they still had two more to go that night. Brad showed no signs of slowing down as he jumped into the crowd at Piano’s and played the guitar on the floor.
The closing band for the daytime showcase at Piano’s was Portland’s Morning Teleportation, playing their mix of psychedelic, funk, and disco rock. The last time I saw them play, they opened for Modest Mouse at the Williamsburg Waterfront, and performed on a massive stage in front of thousands as the sun set over East River, just before a thunderstorm with a rumored tornado wreaked havoc on the city.
It was good to see the band play again, but I think the venue was too small and dark for their style. This Piano’s performance was the last show of a very long summer tour, their most recent leg being with the Flaming Lips. The Lips let them use their massive light backdrop and MT had a video engineer with them on the road. The band tried to capture the same feeling using the overhead projector at Piano’s and had intense visuals with fractals on the wall behind drummer Tres Coker. They closed out their set with the song “Just a Figment,” with a chorus so catchy it had me singing well on to the next venue for the night.
The Fader Fort seemed to be the place to go on this Saturday evening. As opposed to the previous day, the venue was packed. Everyone was jammed in to see LA’s Glasser play her last set of CMJ. Cameron Mesirow aka Glasser, just returned from Europe and had played two previous NYC performances at the Apple store and the Pitchfork Offline Fest. The Apple store you might ask? Mesirow recorded last year’s Apply EP using Apple’s GarageBand program.
Glasser has definitely become an indie favorite with the blogs, and the front of the stage was packed with photographers and videographers trying to capture a moment of this live show, complete with chill beats and Mesirow’s soft vocals. After a full week of extremely energetic bands, Glasser was a nice way to wind down the festival.
