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SXSW Review: Anathallo
(9:40 p.m. Wednesday, Mohawk)
The dreamy indie pop of Chicago’s Anathallo plays like a spacier, synth-driven Sufjan Stevens, and if you listen to the soaring melodies and twinkling orchestral instrumental work on their albums, you’ll probably expect something timid but charming from their live performance.
But Anathallo’s Wednesday night showcase on the indoor stage of the Mohawk was nothing short of explosive. The seven-piece would begin one song softly shaking handheld bells, and by the middle bass drums were booming over complex vocal arrangements, all of which stopped and started with well-planned precision to let floating piano progressions swell.
The band’s sharply executed performance was no accident. The tightly packed crowd before the stage waited anxiously for Anathallo to set up well past the time their showcase was scheduled to begin, but the band made sure they were ready before diving into their set, assuring the sound techs in the back of the room that they’d cut a song to make up for the lost time.
This extra attention to detail paid off. Old songs like “A Great Wind, More Ash” began with blasting drumbeats that slipped into a stumbling romp, while the bobbing vocal filler of “Italo” from last year’s “Floating Canopy” swam swiftly over brass instrumentation coupled with distorted guitars.
The only downside? The snippets of discernible lyrics you get from Anathallo songs hint at intriguing storylines — the band explained before “Lost Ring Finger” that the song is about Neil Armstrong and an unfortunate accident with a grain truck — but you can never quite follow them because the vocal delivery is so fast and densely layered. But the band’s aural ambience alone is worth getting lost in.
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