Casiokids – March 19, 2009 – Red House, Austin TX (SXSW)

I went from hating this band to adoring them: a lesson in the value of staying for an entire set – it was more keyboard hell: they had a whole network of them (4?) with 3 guys managing them – guitar and drums too – everybody had on those fluorescent plastic sunglasses the kids like – initial impressions: like one of those clap bands – ambient electronic – yawn – then they started looping in video game sounds and then they started sounding like The Unicorns (which is a good thing) – and then there was disco and wah wah – I don’t know enough about electronic music to say but there’s a certain deep wall of undertone screech they can do that I really like – suddenly they were The Chemical Brothers and I began to adore them – there were some authentic pounding club moments but they tended to emphasize the goofy rather than the intensity but the intensity was there – the interesting thing about them to me was that they were a mix of an electronic band and a band-band – additionally, the vocals were dissonant with the music in some ways (kind of an indie rock complaint style) but once I got up and started watching them it made more sense – they also put on a great stage show, throwing microphones in a call and response across the stage to each other!