Last Night: Sound Tribe Sector 9's predictable set keeps a sold-out Red Rocks crowd happy
With guests Thievery Corporation and Alex B
09.10.10|Red Rocks Amphitheatre
The Red Rocks lots were understandably mobbed before Friday night's sold-out STS9 show; the atmospheric improvisational group is always a huge draw in Denver, and the act proved why it continues to sell out shows on the first night of its two-night run. But first, Alex B of Pnuma Trio and the incomparable Thievery Corporation warmed up the crowd.
I arrived just as Alex B was wrapping up his set, but what I heard of it was gorgeous -- eerie ambient beats resonating from the unusual instrumentation. It took a few minutes to set up the stage for Thievery Corporation -- who have two percussionists, a guitarist, a bassist, a DJ and a sound engineer/live PA artist -- as well as a roster of five to seven vocalists who are part of the group, and other instruments that get thrown into the mix depending on the song.
The Corporation took the stage at 8:30 p.m. for their first-ever Red Rocks show since the group formed in 1996, and opened with "Mandala," in all its deep-bass-and-funky-tribal-drums glory. The guitar player snaked across the stage on his tiptoes while a sitarist twanged and allowed his instrument to sing through the melody. This merged into "Lebanese Blonde," the down-tempo grooves juicy and thick, before the band played "Shadows of Ourselves," a song sung in French.
Thievery Corporation is equal parts '70s funk, reggae, down-tempo/trip-hop, world and hip-hop, blended effortlessly together via the sound engineer. The outfit always brings the energy when it plays; 99 percent of the crowd around me was dancing furiously as the group played songs like "Until the Morning," "The Numbers Game," the blissed-out down-tempo French number "La Femme Parallel," "All That We Perceive," "Hare Krishna," "Exilio (Exile)," "Vampires" and "The Heart's Lonely Hunger" before finishing off with "Warning Shots," which included a sample from J-Kwon's "Tipsy."
You never know where Thievery Corporation is headed next, and whether the act is singing in French, Spanish, English or some other language, the audience is equally engaged and shaking ass to those sweet, funky grooves. The group put on a fabulous show every time that's a pleasure to watch. And it's damn near impossible to keep still while the music is playing. The set was over too soon, but Theivery got the crowd going for STS9.
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