Amon Tobin + Emika @ Metropolis

October 24th marked the return of Amon Tobin’s ISAM show in Montreal, following a premiere last June at Mutek ‘11.

Emika, the Berlin-based dubstep singer/producer and recent Ninja Tune signee, opened the night. In contrast  with Amon Tobin’s audio-visual spaceship that was about to emerge from behind the curtain, Emika came armed with a minimal amount of gear, but still delivered a powerful set of live electronics, manipulating her voice using two microphones running through FX boxes while stomping on a drum machine and a Waldorf synthesizer. Her defiant attitude while standing on the edge of the stage with very little audience interaction  matched the harshness of the sounds she used to build complex rhythms and melodies at earth-shattering bass and sub-bass levels.

The tension in the sold-out Métropolis built even more during an unusually lengthy break in-between the two acts, most probably to insure the smooth functioning of Amon Tobin’s high-tech machinery. Yet the wait was worth it as the crowd burst into applause when the massively impressive superstructure of various-sized cubes, one of which large enough to accommodate the artist and his whole control room, was revealed. Amon Tobin immediately set on to showcase a breathtaking hour-and-a-half of computer-generated visuals synec to a futuristic soundtrack made up of deconstructed sound fragments from his ISAM album, which he augmented with a wide range of sound effects that would not have been out of place in an interstellar war videogame. Full of electronic zaps, swooshes and booms only occasionally relieved by organic sounds, the sonic content of the show was of extremely high calibre, showing to the sceptics that Tobin’s innovative stage design had not been made at the music’s detriment. Fluidly shifting between scenes and ambiances, the projections evolved from a galactic mesh of 3D-mapped constellations and shape-shifting spacecrafts into an abstract mixture of distorted lasers, pulsating waveforms and every visually stunning animation you can (or can’t) think of. With his ISAM experience, Amon Tobin visits a whole universe beyond most of today’s electronic acts. Not only do you get to hear the sounds made by a gigantic, terrific-looking robot, but you also get to see that gigantic, terrific-looking robot in full action. The glimpses we got of Amon Tobin only served to remind us that at the heart of all this technologic dementia lies a human, and a very inspired one.

-Alex P hosts Club Terrestre on Tuesday nights from 11pm-12am