REPORTING LIVE: WOBBLE WEDNESDAY & LOTUS

After two days of ultra-good music- Supersillyus and the Zebbler Encanti Experience at this week’s Wobble Wednesday at Wonder Bar, then Lotus at the Dise- it matters not that the summer festival season is winding down. Might as well have all these awesome organic and electronic masterminds come right to Boston. Photos by Miles Quinn

Somehow I’ve managed to get right in front at Lotus’ show, a foot away from guitarist Mike Rempel, which is awesome because I can see him smile and close his eyes as he plays—reveling, living, breathing his music. From time to time it’s easy to drift into the same state during the fluttering beginning of “Sour Cherry;” my eyelids close and I’m grinning widely

as the guitar riffs climb
and climb,

weave and
wind around me.

Then the jam picks up, gains momentum…the voltage of the speakers and the crowd is in perfect sink and it’s rising as tubes of silver light shoot horizontally and brush the tops of heads as fingers wave through the beams, hypnotized by the sight of their skin through the sparkles.

The tempo builds. Hands stretch high. Luke Miller’s converse softly presses and releases his peddle and I wonder for the fifteenth time this show at drummer Mike Greenfield’s skill.

Photo by Miles Quinn

Greenfield’s funky cymbals and snare drive it, the crowd follows and then BOOM—pulsing lights turn on as they break into a heavy jam, and I can only see flailing arms and glow sticks and the energy in the faces of the band members when they’re illuminated every other half-second. Someone throws a water bomb, everyone is so pumped that they’re clapping and screaming for more and we’re all off our feet and smiling broadly, uncontrollably,  (stupidly—I sometimes think about how I must look). And we’re all here for one thing:

LOTUS. OH YEAHHHH.

The Dise was sold out for Lotus … seems to be a trend this week. It started Wednesday night with a sold out Wobble Wednesday at Wonder Bar. Thanks to the Brain Trust, instead of barely breaching the hump of the week, I now look forward to Wednesdays. And this week was one I’ve been waiting for:

Supersillyus. Pancakes. Zebbler. Encanti. PANCAKES.

“10:30 come early!” My friend Bilkwon the Chef texts me on Wednesday night.

“Ok. Only if I get a pancake mofo b there soon!”

30 minutes later I’m in the midst of a laser-light dance fest munching on a CHOCOLATE CHIP pancake.

Supersillyus and Bilkwon the pancake prince are dancing away… always intriguingly clad: this time Rob Uslan’s got on a full suit and tie AND the big platinum blonde wig and bug-eye sunglasses from the Big Up.

Beneath the other-worldly projections behind the stage, below a light show mutating between sunset and deep ocean color schemes, everyone spins and dips to the dripping bleeping samples that bounce off the walls or splatter us with bursts of good feeling—live painting on canvases to my right, smiling whirling friends to my left, a giant purple wizard hat atop a different head every time I twist my hips to the conga-like beat.

Then Zebbler and Encanti take the stage and I’m psyched. This Wobble Wednesday is actually in honor of the release of the Zebbler Encanti Experience‘s first dual EP the day before, The Final Sign, which some kid happened to give me a free copy of after the show.

Zebbler Encanti Experience Spring Tour 2011 Mix by Zee

After meeting these guys at Bisco, I loved them immediately, and heard they were working on something, but had no idea it was something that would blow my face so far off they called me from China saying they found it the next day.

One word for the sound: BOOM.

Or maybe toads painted in neon paint hopping around a bubbling swamp of gloriousness.

Anyways, check out this INSANE video they concocted of the mix, proving the artistic genius of Zebbler, the Shpongletron mastermind:

The Final Sign (Music video by Zebbler Encanti Experience) from Zebbler on Vimeo.

Speaking of Bisco, I once called Posford and Raja Ram “partners in crime.” I think Zebbler and Encanti fit this description even more. Throughout the set they whisper to each other behind Zebbler’s hand, and I know they’re planning some deliciously dank dub. Their build ups fly way above Wonder Bar, and when they crash down with that serious bass, Encanti climbs up on the speakers, shooting his arm up and down along with the entire crowd, as Zebbler’s dreads bang around him at a four-foot radius—every drop is a pulled trigger of a loaded gun.

The combination of the way the two are so in sync, that level of power, Zebbler’s sinister vocals, and those beyond-Bassnectar bass drops, intertwined with experimental, deep jungle sounds reminiscent of Shpongle made my night. That was some seriously epic shit, and I expect these guys to go a long way. The sounds are not meant for this world anyway.

I thought Wednesday couldn’t be topped,

… until I find myself front and center of the crowd at Paradise on Thursday night for one of my long-time favorite bands, Lotus—it’s like my birthday and Christmas combined.

Looking around me, I think everyone would agree. We’re all totally overtaken by the music. I wish I could capture this mood of total happiness, where everyone is jumping, smiling, grooving and moving like this—and keep it in my pocket to whip out on a rainy day.

Then I hear the first notes of “Spiritualize” and

It.Is.OVER.

I am in 100% Lauren Metter happy mode. At that exact moment I look up and see Bilkwon the pancake man and some of my other friends, which makes the fun-level of the show break all scales—all the while Lotus’ beautiful video game soundtrack and the spectacular light show envelope us.

I run up to the balcony for the last songs and scream my brains out for the encore. The swaying shouting crowd looks like hundreds of blue men, then pink men, under a spider web of green beams. Miles comes running up looking stricken—

“Some dude bumped into me and knocked the batteries out of my camera, I had to run back to the car then to buy more, I was looking for you EVERYWHERE!”

I grab his shoulder and turn him towards the stage. The guys are picking up their instruments and back to give the fans they love what they want. Amidst the first notes of the slow, melodious “Orchids,” off their new album from last week, I sigh and take in the sight of blues and purples cooling down the club with the soft, soothing music, bleeding into “Age of Inexperience.”

Photos by Miles Quinn

By the end of the show Miles had chatted with the whole band and gotten Luke Miller to lovingly lick his keyboard. Forget battery explosions and camera disasters—Lotus is one of those bands who does everything they can for their fans. Shaking hands, giving hugs and answering questions smilingly til the minute they board their bus and head out for to the next stop of their tour.

Outside, fans are so blown away there are group hugs going on outside the Dise.

After two days of ultra-good shows, it matters not that the summer festival season is winding down. Might as well have all these awesome bands and DJs come right to Boston… and when it’s 2 am and people give Boston shit for “shutting down early,” I have one thing to say:

WE kept dancing.

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