Local mainstay Andy Dixon has recently been producing dubsteppy, glitchy re-imaginings of modern hip-hop under the name Caving. On this night, chopped-up vocal samples from the likes of Jay-Z and Missy Elliott ran tandem with wonky, wobbly grooves and Secret Mommy-style squeaks to compose a seamless set that excited the crowd to various levels of gyration. Dixon had people who wouldn’t bother with a mainstream hip-hop night grooving to Beyoncé and Slim Thug with swampy bass lines as an outlet for people to indulge their secret love of urban sounds. Check out his MySpace page for a taste.
Afterwards, Dixon’s small table of gear was moved aside to reveal a much larger table with much more gear, which was to be home to Bristol’s Fuck Buttons until just before one a.m. The duo switched between hazy, beat-driven panoramas (“Surf Solar”), forays into primitive tribalism (“Ribs Out”) and harsh noise odysseys (“Sweet Love for Planet Earth”). It was everything you might expect from their album Tarot Sport: a kraut-ish journey through hypnotic rhythms, atop which was built a tower of esoteric synth creations and textured fuzz.
And yet, it was also something more: the mutated electronica spewed forth from the Biltmore’s speakers brought a whole range of emotion into the low-ceilinged room. For some, this was set to be one of the best shows they’ve seen in the past year; others were oblivious, and ended the night so drunk they could barely stand. Some people got visibly intimate on the dance floor; others, it seemed, may have been torn apart. Some moved their bodies with deep-rooted feeling, started violent scuffles near the stage or even crowdsurfed. Others remained consistently motionless—some completely entranced and others perhaps merely patient.
Fuck Buttons’ music, so wide in sonic scope, also demonstrated an expansive psychological scope, leaving people shaken and affected by the time the final notes of “Sweet Love” had become only a memory. The performance became a ravishing experience, not to be taken lightly nor to be soon forgotten.
