KRAVMAGA

Jean-Benoit Dunckel and Nicolas Godin are Modernists. This doesn't mean that they walk around damp Parisian streets wearing parkas and listening to The Who. Air embrace the new. Each album is a move away from the last and journey towards something else. Their music is intellectually stimulating and empty-headedly simple; elegaic and triumphal; beyond pop and yet resolutely of it, too.


So that was an excerpt off Air's website. Pretty much a good description of their music.

I went to their concert last night at the Nob Hill Masonic Center and it was pretty much mind-blowing. This was my first time seeing them live, and I kinda just started to listen to their music. My favorite track was "Run" and they played it. I was 'bout to get up and take a jog that song got me so nutty.

But throughout the concert all I was thinking was ROCK ME HARDER. Yes, I had some high expectations, so instead of my mind being blown to the row behind me, I wanted it to be blown to the balconies. Given, Air was playing at the Masonic Center, and I don't know if you have seen the immediate vicinity, but it smells of yuppie. I mean, the venue had assigned seating, and the extent of what Air was thinking was probably, "Is the crowd diggin' us? I can't tell cuz they're sitting down and it's dark in here."

But they probably got the hint after the encore.

So they started a bit off, the band was off beat, and playing slower than the album versions, but it picked up as soon as Air saw the sea of head nods. All I'm going to say now is that I need to see Air in their natural habitat. I want to see them truly rock out.