CONCERT RECAP: Chelsea Light Moving @ One Eyed Jacks, New Orleans, LA 11/4/13

Having a show in New Orleans the Monday post Voodoo Fest might spell for disaster on paper, as was potentially the case for last week’s Chelsea Light Moving / Merchandise show at One Eyed Jacks, but it turns out Thurston Moore was plenty prepared for the show this time around and it ended with a super strong set by the end and a fantastic encore.

Merchandise had the daunting task of opening up the potentially disastrous show. The crowd was sparse at best, but it didn’t really seem to faze the band at all. The Tampa natives blended their brand of Sothern rock with some heavy Velvet Underground undertones to pull off a fun set. The thin crowd afforded Carson Cox the luxury of milling around the crowd and breaking the fourth wall during their last song.

“I bought another Sonic Youth album and it sucked… it’s just noise.” – Juno

Chelsea Light Moving is the latest project from Sonic Youth’s Thurston Moore and could have very easily just have been called Sonic Youth 2.0, but such is the problem/case with almost all the Sonic Youth side projects. Odds are if you don’t like Sonic Youth, you probably won’t like Chelsea Light Moving. The album, Chelsea Light Moving, echoes in so many ways ghosts of Experimental Jet Set, not that that’s a bad thing, but it’s the immediate impressions one gets from listening to the record. The ten song set was of course mostly comprised of that material and three new tracks and a Thurston track.

At first glance, one would think the set would’ve be short after listening to the disc, but they would be highly surprised at the fact it wasn’t. Thurston and company took the opportunity to expand on almost every track played. Expanded introductions and exits were the norm for the evening. Thurston joked that the last time he played in town he was less than prepared, but the set at hand was one of well-crafted genius. The evening’s encore was by far the most epic part of the show. Bassist Samara Lubelski returned to the stage with her violin and the band launched into a haunting and epic version of “Ono Soul” from Thurston’s solo album Psychic Hearts. The evening ended with an onslaught of sound only rivaled by Thurston’s “main” band.