SFist Reviews: Asobi Seksu and Bell at the Independent

Asobi Seksu

by Moses Namkung

Comedic Bay Area-specific commentary at the Independent on Friday night:

"San Francisco!", Bell lead singer Olga Bell said, "You guys have hot buns and quads!"... [one song later] "Is there a smoke machine in here... or is it just your smokin' quads?"

"You know what I love about the West Coast?", Asobi Seksu lead singer Yuki Chikudate asked, "When I'm here, I'm not the only fucking Asian!" (The Asian contingent in the crowd timidly cheered.)

(Opener Resplandor, from Peru, sadly made no such jokes.)

In Olga Bell's excellent covers of Bjork's (via Betty Hutton's) It's Oh So Quiet and Radiohead's Videotape/Thom Yorke's Eraser, one is first struck by Bell's clear, confident voice. And, as discovered on Friday, she has a clear, confident stage presence to match. The set was playful, emotional and quirky, and on stage, there was a lot going on: the New England Conservatory graduate, classically trained in piano, was backed by an array of percussion and electronica, and Bell herself at times was multi-tasking between keyboard and one sweet piece of musical equipment: the keytar.

Bell performed tracks off of their self-released EP, such as "Echinachea" and "Housefire". It's quite refreshingly original, so give it a listen.

As for the headliners: Seksu's third album, Hush, has some standout tracks, but favorites from the set mostly included songs from their critically acclaimed second album, Citrus: "New Years" and "Goodbye".

And, standing on the left side by the speakers, your local SFist correspondent was blown away when Asobi Seksu opened their set, kind of like this (... like, not really, but you get the point). They, uh, rock out. Hard. Had to take a couple steps back, at first. Then, during "Strawberries", near the end, when strobes flashed and heads banged, the huge wall of sound forced another multiple-step retreat. Yeah, their live shows have got a bit of tinnitus-inducing power.