The story of Moon Duo is basically that all of the guys in Wooden Shjips went into a truck stop outside of SF on their way to a gig in Portland to get a greasy breakfast. The crusty beard-lord guitarist met a sexy nihilist babe playing pinball and decided to stick around. Said adios to the guys, did some heroin in the restroom, got in her car and listened to Suicide records all the way back to his garage and then jammed for hours. And it rocked.
Moon Duo takes the full on psychedelic style and strips it down to more introspective, inner-mind space explorations. They don’t feel quite like songs as such either, more like six hour jam sessions coalesced down into six minute excerpts, and it works really well. The sparse, minimal keyboard-bass skeleton provided by the chick with the too-cool-for-the-world asymmetrical fringe is a great base for the guitar work on top. The drum machine beats in the background don’t intrude but provide and unchanging propulsive beat to keep the momentum going. The whole effect is like sub-arctic chill-riders guiding their motorcycle out of a k-hole. OK, it’s not quite that good. I wish it was that good. But it’s still pretty dang good, especially live.
The biggest weakness here is the lack of material, but that will change in time. Hopefully they will continue to find new directions to take the music as well because at the moment it’s a bit one-note. But it’s a really good note, it’s almost an untouched snapshot of their typical Sunday afternoon wastoid jam odyssey being taken on tour. So go on Moon Duo! We’re all rooting for you.
By Marcus O’Sullivan
