Deerhoof – ULU London, 02/12/2008

Hurray for San Fran quartet Deerhoof! They make music that is both complex and engaging and yet it never actually feels like you might need a physics degree to decode it. It’s more like piecing together some kind of soft play technicolour jigsaw or piloting a bone shaking cart through some hyper real cartoon-like landscape. Perhaps it’s the presence of singer/bassist Satomi Matsuzaki whose petite frame and chiming childlike vocals lift Deerhoof out of the “Dude, check out my time signatures” territory stalked by so many wilfully oblique post-rock types and into something that at times (with some clever editing) you could almost play to your Mum. Or indeed your 4 year old niece.

Drummer Greg Saunier and Matsuzaki are the only enduring members from the original line up, but the quartet, completed by guitarists John Dieterich and Ed Rodriguez, sound conceivably like they might have been playing together since birth – so disciplined and precise is their delivery tonight. And lining up virtually shoulder-to-shoulder along the length of the stage it both looks and sounds like a proper group effort as opposed to simply the Satomi Matsuzaki show.

Listening to their records is something like watching Magic being performed on telly; no matter how much you want to believe, you still suspect there’s some kind of computer trickery or compiling of multiple takes afoot as they sound almost implausibly complex and yet still tourniquet tight. In the flesh then, their music is all the more thrilling and they pirouette effortlessly through twitchy funk and blasts of screeching post-rock before heading into the sweetest of melodic refrains often within the space of a couple of minutes. Matsuzaki is a compelling performer, one minute cooing and caressing her violin bass, the next bounding up and down on the spot like a tempestuous toddler or straddling the monitor wedges at the front of the stage. To her left is the whirlwind presence of powerhouse drummer Greg Saunier who locks the whole thing together with stunning technique and dynamic control, allowing the band to swoop from apocalyptic rage to a sinister whisper in a split second.

Friend Oppurtunity’s ‘Imperfect Me’ boasts some blistering slide work from Dieterich and ‘Spirit Ditties of No Tone’ off The Runners Four boasts a gnawing lead line that, at full tilt, sounds like a small animal burrowing into your brain before it switches into a menacing syncopated groove, slams shut with a whip crack snare and promptly dissolves into a haze of exquisite controlled feedback. It’s more excitement and poise crushed into one live rendering of a song than most bands can manage across an entire world tour. And, at its best, it’s breathtaking.

A rapturous response ensures a rare encore and ‘Basketball Get Your Groove Back’ sees Matsuzaki pointing and gesticulating wildly as if conducting some vast indie orchestra in her mind. ‘Holy Night Fever’ wraps things up and the band hurry off stage looking visibly drained although the feeling is that tonight’s rampant audience would have allowed them to play for the next decade, given the choice.

Deerhoof on Myspace