Oh Yeah! - Ono

On Monday June 30th I went to see Chicago no-wavers, Ono, at Howlers. I had originally planned to see Jello Biafra & the Guantanamo School of Medicine, but I figured he would be back soon, and this was much more mysterious and unknown to me. It turned out to be a good decision.

Dream Weapon played first. His set was industrial and sample heavy becoming harsh at times, but mostly being dancey with hard beats. There was some cool reverb manipulation. The set went on a little long, fading out once or twice and then starting again with a different "song".

KMFD had a tough setup, buzzing like a bee for a few minutes. After getting started for real, Keith had some more issues with getting the right beats going, but it also got pretty dancey (nobody danced) once he made up his mind. There were floaty keyboards that clashed and met with the beat stopping, starting, and changing. At one point it sounded almost as if KMFD was playing the Final Fantasy title screen music and later an X-Files sounding thing. It got way too long by the end, and Manny seemed kind of anxious to get the show moving along, but I liked the freeform chaos, and Keith looked pretty damn cool doing it.

Owner dropped and who really cares; Ono was up next/last. Damn did they rule! Creative sampling, clinking guitars, synth bass, very tight drumming, and a frontman-cum-religious prophet, Patti Smith meets Sun Ra. He gave a sermon of playfully serious insectile, sexualised dada. The Valley of the Dolls and The Wizard of Oz chimed in between tracks. Ono's frontman, Travis, danced with the crowd as a non sequitur, sludged up, music hall song played along. Travis' attire consisted of at times, a red gown, a white robe, and a black dress with long white antenna-ish appendages and a bowtie. Ono is one of the coolest bands that I've seen, and, despite being formed in 1980, this was there first tour. Be sure to catch Ono if you can, and definitely check out there newest release here: http://monikerrecordsss.bandcamp.com/album/ono-diegesis.