I was supposed to take some digital pictures of Bigelf, the world’s most analog band, when irony came along and most rudely back-nutted me. Bigelf sat before my naked and steaming eyes looking much like the detritus of a Frank Zappa yard sale with their collection of Moog synths, giant stacks of Orange amps and all sorts of other vintage type keyboards connected to wah pedals, but could I take a picture? No. Why? The barely one month old digital camera could not cut through the thick fog generated by the over zealous smoke machine. Damn you, irony.

A picture says a thousand words so I’m going to do a word count at the end of this review and tell you to get off your ass and see Bigelf.

An awkward distance existed between the band and the audience for the entire show. While Bigelf fans comprised at least 50% of the audience, everyone seemed to be puzzled by the rather unorthodox stage set-up which consisted of a shit-load of vintage synths and keyboards. The small stage at Wasted Space couldn’t fully contain the bulk of Bigelf and their backup guitar rack overflowed onto the bathroom entrance where an anxious roadie guarded them. Their frontman stood in the middle of the stage, flanked by several echelons of organs and analog synths. He would play one on each side while singing, looking like a Prog rock hydra. Unorthodox, no?

Playing live, Bigelf sounded almost exactly like their latest album, Cheat the Gallows (which is awesome, by the way) with a little more guitar in the overall mix. The whole spectacle reminded me of watching a giant white whale tear up an old wooden ship with the Sabbathy guitar riffs and organ/synth flourishes laid on top. They played all your favorite Bigelf hits like "Money, It's Pure Evil," "The Evils of Rock N' Roll" and my all-time fav, "Blackball." 

 

Word Count: 165

Now, go buy some tickets to SXSW because Bigelf will be playing there on March 20th.