Biography
Absurdist
composer and electronic musician, Dan Deacon, is based in Baltimore, Maryland.
Musically influenced by Devo, Talking Heads, Scratch Orchestra, People Like Us,
Raymond Scott and Conlon Nancarrow, Dan’s music strives to take contemporary
experimental composition and electronic music out of the circle of the esoteric
intellectual gangs and hipster communities, placing it into the more informal
“fun time.” His high-energy performances consist of song-structured
material performed with Casio keyboard, computer, vocoder and many whosits and
whatsits to process his voice and signal generator. Click
Here For More.
Reviews
Underneath,
some of the reviews are the entire review/article that in some way critiqued my
music/performance. The parts that are relevant to me, Dan Deacon, will be in bold
and yellow. This makes me feel very narcissistic, but if you are
on this part of the website than I guess you are here to read reviews about me.
If you desire to read reviews of other people read the non-bolded parts of this
section.
Review
of 6/18/04 Warehouse Next Door Show
Washington City Paper, June 25-July 1, 2004
by Greg Centon
Last Friday I went to Warehouse Next Door on Craig's recommendation to see the
Detholz from Chicago, and I was pleasantly surprised to find four awesome acts
that had almost nothing in common except for their complete absence of suckage.
How often does that happen? I'll tell ya, not often enough.
The Aquarium's (and City Paper's) Jason Hutto opened the show with his solo Third Channel stuff, all classic avant-Casio sounds and old-skool beatbox compositions. Like the Aquarium stuff, the songs are melodically simple, but glazed with the tinny harsh early-digital buzz instead of the rounded tones of the electric piano. Topping it was a slide show of works from City Paper's own Ben Claassen, images that were equal parts beautiful and hilarious.
An indie-rap act from our sister second city, Baltimore, composed of two MCs, Height and Bow 'N Arrow, and their DJ, Shields, were up next. They weren't bad, but I was a lot more impressed with Shields' beats and the oddball distorto audio stir-fry that he assembled than I was with any of the rhymes that I heard. Still, I wish there were more folks doing that kinda stuff around here, but y'know, D.C. just doesn't seem to be a real friendly place for hiphop of any kind.
After them, another Balto act came up and proved to be the high point of the evening for me. Dan Deacon performs an eccentric brand of electronic music that is so distinctive I don't see how he couldn't be a solo act. His digital torture started somewhere between demented circus music and warped polka, but quickly took on lots of hints from more standard pop structures. Even at its most ordinary, which wasn't very ordinary by any usual scale, Deacon took great joy in using his computer and other assorted electronics to twist the sounds beyond any normal expectations, and this was one of the things I liked best about his stuff. Too many folks use computers or synths to play loops or back themselves, but really don't use them to do anything that couldn't be done, more or less, by humans. By contrast, the machine love in Deacon's stuff was obvious; his sounds are inhuman in all the best ways possible.
The more obvious highlight of Deacon's set was the spastic energy of his performance, an even more extreme rarity in the often dull laptop arena. Hell, plenty of plain old rock bands don't have half the nerdly charisma or give off one tenth the sweat he did during his all too short set. And the energy was infectious; before he was two songs into his set the Warehouse had erupted into a spontaneous dance party, and I think we all know exactly how common that is in D.C.
To say that the Detholz had their work cut out for them would be a cliché, but it would also be the truth; the evening had been a long climb and the step we had scaled right before they went on had been a pretty big one. They certainly came equipped to keep the dance party going, playing a set of disco-inspired new wave, complete with the Giorgio Moroder synth patches and "shup-shup" hi-hats. They even opened with a dirgey cover of "Celebration" by Kool and the Gang, to which they slowly added Devo-esque bits, chunks of early Talking Heads' nervey paranoia, and even some vocal work that recalled nothing so much as "Mr. Roboto." Thing is, I got the feeling that the "weirdness" they worked hard to project was a lot more contrived and theatrical than any of the stuff we'd seen earlier in the evening, and that just rubbed me the wrong way. It was really just bad luck on their part; if they'd been paired with any of a number of more ordinary bands they would have been more affecting, but there are few acts out there that could make any kind of an impression following Dan Deacon. Here's hoping that he makes the trip down the B-W Parkway frequently.
Suckotash@WashingtonCityPaper.com
Copyright © 2004 Washington Free Weekly Inc.
Review
of 520/04 Warwick, NY Performance
theInvador.org, July, 2004
by Invador Staff
The Invader Editorial Board was delighted to attend a recent performance of the consummate experimental act, Dan Deacon, in Warwick, New York. Invader editors were ‘shocked and awed’ by the lively and bizarre performance of Deacon’s dances, screams and emphatic exclamations. The delightful and eclectic music was created as well as composed by Deacon, and filled the room and the streets outside with an air of ‘drama, excitement and rapture’.
The Invader, as well as ODFI, look forward to more musical compositions and amazing performances from this leader in experimental music. A visit to Deacon’s web site revealed many interesting pieces of news, downloads and images as well as personal and tour information.
editors@theinvader.org
Copyright © 2004 theinvador.org
"Imagine
Sifl & Olly produced by Fennesz, and maybe it would be like this. except,
[Twacky Cats EP] is more awesome."
Paul Simpson, RPM Director/Asst. Music Director
WRSU
88.7FM, Rutgers University
