The Calm Blue Sea: Miska’s, Chicago 09/05/09

I told you I had an amazing few days with lovely musical people. Well, along with spending some quality time with The Calm Blue Sea (who put on a really wonderful show for what turned out to be a disappointingly small crowd of us) I met two guys who make up The Soil and The Sun. I want to tell you all about them, but first, the four really cool guys from Austin, TX.  I don’t want to take away from what The Calm Blue Sea did and traveled so far to do for us lucky few here in Chicago. And let me say, their final number, ”Literal” was phenomenally good and even if it hadn’t been dedicated to me, I’d have been wow’d by it! The venue was small and underpopulated. The floor was shiny and surrounded by mirrors so playing with electricity and amplifiers was particularly tricksy, I was told. Chris took his shoes off mid-song on the first number, which puzzled but amused me and lent a sort of homey, casual air to the whole non-event, event. The Calm Blue Sea didn’t play a long set, as there were four acts on the bill Saturday night and they wanted to give everyone fair time. That’s a typical Chicago practice, unfortunately, booking so many bands into one night,  and while the bar thinks they might come out ahead it really does no favors to the musicians. Chicago really sucks for indie bands, I’m afraid to say. So, if you can do anything for a band coming through town, please go ahead and buy them a beer, put them up on your sofa, eh?

Back to the positive! These Austin guys rocked out! Two really creative guitarists, a solid, strong all-over-the-neck kinda bass player and a drummer who knows just when to hit it hard, and right, and sweet. The Calm Blue Sea has an array of songs that capture your imagination. Musically, I find myself working hard to remember that playing like that is NOT as effortless as they make it out to be. In other words, they make it look so easy to produce these complicated, beautiful, yet also clearly delineated cathedrals of songs. There’s a really dense writer that I studied in college, whose work was described as being structured grammatically like cathedrals. Each sentence was complexity built on complexity; from a foundation of an idea it increasingly spiraled out of control in layers of theoretical complications , so that by the end of the paragraph-long sentence you had lost the point, way up in the towers of it and had to go back. But if you did, you could see how it made sense. The more you read him, the more you knew what to look for and after about 1200 pages or so it became quite easy to wade through the architecture of it all. The Calm Blue Sea does this with music but they clear the path from the beginning so that there’s no need to go back. As the song is wrapping up, you hear that refrain you heard at the start, perhaps down a third or up a fifth or something. But it’s there, connecting the whole back together again. In the middle is this tangle of smaller excursions and spirals of flourishes and other places they go and circle round again. And as it builds and falls, Chris rises off his chair, Kyle grooves in and out, inching closer and further away from the center, and Aaron (who is joining them from the great band Cougar, for this tour) often crouched down to his controls, provides amazing cover with a dense and intricate array of guitar stylings. All the while Steve lays in wait for the perfect moments to pounce with his sticks or brush or foot pedal and his drums carry every everyone off and on their way.

I have to say, Miska’s isn’t the first choice of venues in this town. But all four acts that night gave great performances and it was a beautiful night of music. Crooks and Children were engaging and interesting as they were the last time I saw them. I’m always intrigued by their switching of instruments after every song. For a band to be so versatile as that, it’s wonderful to hear so much variety and talent. I’ve got a few of their CDs on my pile and a more thorough review is in order and on its way!

The Calm Blue Sea is halfway through their tour, do go and catch their show. You’ll certainly not regret it and talk to them before or after the show, they’re a great group of guys! xoxo

Buy The Calm Blue Sea here
Buy Seigfried here
reviewed here

Tour Details
09/07 Toronto, ON – NEU+RAL
09/08 Morgantown, WV – 123 Pleasant St
09/09 Pittsburgh, PA – Brillobox
09/10 Columbus, Ohio – Bernie’s
09/11 Cincinnati, Ohio – Covenant Church (4139 Kirby Avenue)