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At first it was hard to tell if it had begun, and what exactly it was. So Percussion had quietly positioned themselves in one corner of the stage and the lights had dimmed, and when the Museum of Fine Art's sold-out Remis Auditorium had hushed itself we began to hear a net of beads rubbing around a gourd-shaped object in front of a microphone. This gentle clacking was joined by some barely-perceptible fuzz and a few lonely notes from a xylophone or a glockenspiel. Maybe twelve minutes later, one of the percussionists asked the audience if we were awake. Those of us who didn't answer in the affirmative definitely regained consciousness with the next piece: the first movement of Steve Reich's "Drumming" was an intricate four-bongo affair that So Percussion pulled off with energy and astounding precision, as much an athletic feat as a musical performance.
And then M. C. Schmidt and Drew Daniel joined them. Those who'd looked forward to seeing a show based on their most recent album, The Rose Has Teeth In The Mouth of the Beast—the show Matmos had been perfecting over the course of their whole tour—may have been disappointed; those eager for new material (and this Bostonist, whose understanding of Matmos beyond a dusty 12" they did with Rachel's is mostly secondhand) got to enjoy collaborations unique to Thursday night's show. Matmos brought electronic sounds—sometimes warm, sometimes earsplitting—to So Percussion's drumming; a riot of banging, screeching, and squawking gave way to M.C. Schmidt's political monologue on imperialism and hegemony, with delicate arrangements of "Simple Gifts" and other traditional American songs twinkling in the background.
For much of the evening, the stage was dark except for the glow of an iBook reflected on Drew Daniel's face. Sometimes the musicians became iPod silhouettes, anonymous black shapes against the blank screen behind them. The middle of the show had Somerville's own Keith Fullerton Whitman improvisational with bass that disturbed (but didn't quite shake) the air and shimmering, spacy sounds that seemed to circle above our heads; he and his impressive beard were mostly hidden from our view behind a tangle of wires and boxes. So we appreciated the few visuals we were offered: M.C. Schmidt using giant metal chopsticks to somehow wring an unearthly whine from lumps of (we think) dry ice; a projected video of cigarette burns being administered to an alien-green arm; a live volunteer getting his head shaved into a short mohawk—we can forgo onomatopoeia and just let our readers imagine what sounds went into the song that resulted in this haircut.
The visuals, though scarce, prompted several respectable patrons of the arts to relinquish their seats at the front of house, even before technical difficulties arose: Matmos popped in a DVD of an unidentified androgynous ass being slapped by an unidentified masculine hand, the video playing in four frames that went out of sync to created a rhythm—we're told that this was to build up into a song, but the DVD player crashed just as the ad hoc drum was getting seriously red. Matmos has promised a disc of the full video to any audience member who sends a self-addressed stamped envelope to the address listed at their site. Bostonist is looking forward to enjoying some avant-garde ass-slapping in the comfort of our own living room.
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