Anonymeye, Ur @ Ric's Bar (23.7.08)

It's been two weeks since this show actually occurred, so I thought that I should write about it today or not at all.

Ur are an instrumental space-rock trio (comprised of three Rockinghorse staffers) that have been playing around Brisbane for a few months now. Usually they're loud and electrified, fusing almost 'classic rock' guitar with synths and repetitive (though non-standard) rhythms. For this particular show, however, they took a leaf from the headliner's book and played largely acoustic. The result of this was that their usual sound took a turn towards the middle-eastern; Exotic scales and droning riffs were the order of the evening, with clattering percussion underscoring it all. It sounded like some sort of sci-fi inflected ancient Egyptian music, or in other words, the perfect alternate score for the movie 'The Fifth Element'. I had only seen Ur once before (the previous time they played Ric's, supporting Del Toro), and I must say that I much preferred this version of the band; it sounded much more unique, and somehow more cohesive. I did find myself zoning out a little bit towards the end of the show, but that might have been more to do with lack of sleep on my behalf. I can imagine that such an experience would have been quite pleasurable when laying in the comfortable couches of somewhere like The Hangar.

Ur don't have a myspace or anything like that, but you can listen to their previous Ric's show via the awesome Brisbane bootleg blog at Turn It Up To 10.


Anonymeye (aka Andrew Tuttle) could technically be labelled as a Melbourne artist these days, but since he spent his formative years and started this project in Brisbane (as well as playing and organising many events here, such as last week's Decline Of Modern Civilisation show at the Tongue & Groove), I figure that we can stretch our metaphorical pages to talk about him [update: apparently he moved back to Brisbane a few months ago]. Tuttle mixes intricate bluegrass fingerpicking with sound manipulations to create a fairly unique atmosphere, since when the two are combined it creates a strange balance between comfortable familiarity and otherworldiness. This evening's set started with more acoustic melodies than electronic drones, easing everyone into Anonymeye's world. After a few minutes of this the electronic elements began to creep in, but they were still in the relative background and served more as a bed of noise on which the guitar lines sat. Gradually the drones took on a more upfront role, with Tuttle alternating between a few bars of picked guitar and a few bars of sound manipulation. I got the feeling that he was having a few technical difficulties, as the electronic elements of his sound weren't coming through clearly and at times the two disparate elements were not gelling - it almost seemed like two parallel sets that were competing for the audience's attention. At other times it all managed to fall into place, but these moments tended to make the more awkward parts even more frustrating. Ric's is also often not the best location for a show like this - as great as it is for a sweaty rock show, the chatter from the mall (and in the room itself) tends to distract when there's more subtle music coming from the stage.