New blog feature, you guys! Animated .gifs! Corny? Perhaps. But I like them. And when I noticed that many of my photos were shot very sequentially, I couldn’t pass up the chance. Besides, with a bill like this, these dudes deserve something more encapsulating than static images.

I was in New York for CMJ this year, but mostly for business. While I didn’t get to catch a lot of the shows I wanted, I made a special appointment to see a blockbuster-ass bill at the celebrated Williamsburg DIY space 285 Kent (co-promoted by mah boi Ric). And what a show it was.

Dustin Wong was the first artist I caught. I was (unfortunately) not terribly familiar with his work before seeing the live show, but in a way, I’m glad it worked out that way. On record, Wong creates compelling, dense, frolicking instrumental guitar meditations. Live, you witness a process that lends an entirely new, more profound appreciation for his approach to six-string monolithicism. Dustin is a board certified master of loops, concocting prismatic soundscapes with little more than his axe, a modest pedal board, a loop station, and an acute knowledge of how to architect tension-and-release swelling psychedelia – too organic to fall within IDM/glitch, too elated for the post rock label. Technical difficulties aside, this was nothing but a treat.

Hoo boy, then came Woodsman. These dudes have kept their calendar thick, releasing a masterful full-length and sonically expansive EP, performing in Cloudland Canyon, running a raw label called Fire Talk, managing a relocation from Colorado to Brooklyn, and genrally keeping their spear sharp. Not that I had forgotten, but there was a reason why the memory of their stage show from South By Southwest burned into cerebral cortex – Woodsman are a four-man tribal motorik assault. They roped in a friend from Tjutjuna to serve as secondary shaman for the show, and as Trevor told me earlier in the evening, they had not even really practiced. You couldn’t tell – the band was as tight as ever, ripping through choice selections from Rare Forms and Mystic Places with equal parts professionalism and controlled insanity. Goddamn… this fuckin’ band. If they roll through your burg, and you sleep on it, you’re probably an asshole.

Finally, what can be said about Amen Dunes‘ terrifying-but-somehow-gorgeous acid pop that hasn’t already been said? Not much. Damon McMahon will mad dog the shit out of you while burnin’ down your barn with aggressive electric head folk that provides the sinister counterpart to the Incredible String Band happy sunshine set. Dude’s such a fuckin’ banshee.