Stereolab, 10/22/08, Wonder Ballroom

Among musicians, Stereolab alone reprsent a great deal of what I consider to be the finer parts of life. Commonly referred to as 'art rock,' their music is evidently the result of deep artistic experimentation with the presentation of musical and philosophical ideas and methods primarily through instruments, heavy on the moog synths. They've shown to have tapped some source that allows the beautiful imagination and creativity of Tim Gane and collaborators to spring forth project after project since 1990. Their sound can be no more accurately described than by words from their very song titles- a cosmic, chemical, visionary, ecstatic, sunshine, unconscious, refrigerator noise groove blast.
Besides all this 'post/art/kraut' rock stuff which kind of sucks to talk about, they are the most absofuckinglutely fun band to listen to. Many indie artists find our sweet spots through nostalgia. Anyone can be nostalgic and everyone's childhood is fascinating to look back on. Vinyl sets us spinning into a more simple, organic, and benign timespace. It's easy to exploit this theme in indie music today. Stereolab continually impress me by the places they look and show us, such as the art rock of the late 60s to which I myself and many others tuned into alternative music of the 90s would not have been otherwise introduced.
It was my older sister who introduced me to Stereolab, with their 2004 LP "Margerine Eclipse" and whom I always looked up to and imagined in green-er indie-er places on the west coast as I grew up. Stereolab makes me feel close to this ideal artcollegestudentlife, and the show on Saturday helped me see that part of that is still alive.
The most endearing and honest-seeming element of the show was how the band came on stage and singer Laetitia Sadier introduced the first song, just by saying "Hello. This song is called 'Percolator.'" This was quite an unexpected first-song choice from their 1996 "Emperor Tomato Ketchup." It served well, however, to whir in the set of hypnotic pop which combined aspects of their best repertoire of the past and the album being promoted, "Chemical Chords." The next song's title bounced through her French accent, "Neon Beanbag," the sweetly satisfying introductory track of Chemical chords.
Needless to say, the set was bomb: aside from some of the best tracks from the new album, they played classics "Ping Pong," "Lo Boob Oscillator," "French Disko," and some truly amazing tracks sans-horns from their 2006 rarities and B-sides album "Fab Four Suture." It was exciting to hear the radical, straight-to-the-point lines come from Laetitia's voice: "we treat our bodies like machines/ fascism winning" from "eye of the volcano" introduced as "a song about freedom fries." It was equally exciting to see her dance kind of like a robot, seeming self-conscious like a french teacher, yet very confident like a, say, French chanteuse.
Dancing to some of my favorite Stereolab songs as well as to krautrock-ish (this basically means really repetitive) jams engendered some sort of understanding with these artists, but, true to their essence, I can continue collecting their millions of LPs, EPs, singles, and B-sides and still discover new things about "Margerine Eclipse" after my billionth listen. I encourage you to take a listen, as no one on earth hates Stereolab.