Monade > Stereolab

[jiji]

So in honor of having bought tickets to see both Stereolab and Monade in October, I finally decided to listen to Monade's stuff, as I never had.  (Monade is a band led by Stereolab's frontwoman Laetitia Sadier.)

And... I feel like this band is where all Stereolab's creativity has gone since Sound Dust or so. The material is similar in instrumentation, rhythms, motifs... but it feels so much more adventurous than anything Stereolab has done in years.  I can't describe the difference too well, because I've just started listening to the albums today, but yeah! 

Maybe one difference is that while Stereolab has been feeling more and more like album after album of bland confections, Monade has more tension, more melancholy.  It's like Monade is going in directions that Stereolab is unable to due to where Tim Gane is creatively, or something. 

There's even a second female vocalist that plays off Laetitia in much the same way that Mary Hansen did before her death. This is something I've been wanting to hear from Stereolab for yeeears, instead of Laetitia playing her bom boms against her own doot doot doos in overdub.

[Don Flamenco]

That's a pretty high recommendation...I'm gonna have to check out Monade.  I've been a 'lab fan for years and haven't bothered to check out any side projects of theirs (just lots and lots of albums by other people where Mary and Laetitia guest sing...and there are a fuckload of those from the late 90s, early 00s.)

And yeah, I was wondering where tim gane's creativity went.  I put up with their stagnation for a long time.  I read reviews for all the post-sounddust/mary stuff and thought the reviewers just didn't get Stereolab....but I couldn't keep up the farce any longer after I heard Chemical Chords  

[jiji]

Follow-up/concert report:

The Oct. 4 Monade/Stereolab show at the Fillmore in NYC was pretty excellent.  Laetitia was in good humor throughout - there's a subtlety to her that you don't get on the albums - and they sounded great.  I wasn't really pleased with some of the keyboard arrangements (the only ETK song played, Cybele's Reverie was the most glaring example), but the version of Double Rocker they played was so amazing that it has made me want to reevaluate Sound-Dust entirely. It was much heavier on the groove and the jamming than the relatively restrained album version. Emergency Kisses was nice, too.  The set focused heavily on material from Chemical Chords, which I just wasn't feeling as much as the older material, except for Neon Beanbag. With older songs, they tended to take one track per album.  French Disko felt SO good.

A (very slow) download of the 10/2 show is available here: http://www.nyctaper.com/?p=398 . I will put it up on Rapidshare or something once it finishes downloading.

Monade's material was relatively subdued, as was appropriate. The second female vocalist/bassist was super cute and laid down the thump nicely.  I was hoping they'd bring her on to sing Mary's parts in Stereolab's set, but those were handled by a male keyboard player instead, which turned out rather nicely. 

[jiji]

As promised, the 10/2 set: http://rapidshare.com/files/151946570/Stereolab_2008-10-02_Irving_Plaza_NYC_-_FOB_Neumann_KM-150s_MP3.zip.html

I think the groop had a chance to iron out any sound ickiness that they experienced that first day, as I remember them sounding noticeably better.  But that could've been the beer.

[Don Flamenco]

the version of Double Rocker they played was so amazing that it has made me want to reevaluate Sound-Dust entirely

not a sound-dust fan? 

thanks for the review...double rocker is indeed really fun live.  They played it in Chicago last time they were around. the Silver Jews are playing the same night as Stereolab this year, so I'll be missing Stereolab.  Not a problem 'cause I'm not a fan of Chemical Chords at all, besides the song Three Women.