MSTRKRFT

I love their name, MSTRKRFT . It's a sign of the times. There are some other bands, products, and even businesses with names like this - abbreviated almost beyond recognition. Many people use Motorola's RAZR cell phone, or the Flickr photo sharing website.

There are a couple of reasons I am aware of for this not-so-new trend. First is the rise of texting. Typing messages with your thumb on tiny cell phone keypads is something to be minimized. Folks have learned to abbreviate in a way that is both efficient and (usually) understandable, and so now have become accustomed to reading and writing this way. Second is the scarcity of decent Internet domain names. If you want your name on the net with the almighty .com extension, you almost have to do something crazy to the name to find one that isn't already taken.

So now that we have that out of the way....

These guys, the best I can gather, are producer/DJ's. Talented, in-demand. I have never really heard an actual album of original music from them, but have heard some impressive remixes and good reviews of their work. My spider senses told me that I should check out their show last night at Mezzanine.

I don't have much disposable income these days, and struggled with whether to get a ticket for a show I didn't know much about... but somehow my legs still walked me right over to their box office the day of the show. My legs made me do it.

I didn't show up for the opening acts. I knew that would be too much standing around, especially since I was going by myself, so I had some drinks at home with Kathleen and Elena and headed down around 11. Even showing up that late, two other DJ's preceded their appearance.

When they did come on, they revealed an impressive stage setup for what is really just two DJ's on the stage. A wall of television screens with some very exciting and vivid video effects. They were silhouetted inside the video madness and appeared as two shadowy figures, complete with hipster cap and bouncy DJ moves. Every now and then one smoked a cigarette. Other than that, you couldn't see much of them. So they, the artists, still remain quite mysterious to me. If I had bumped into one after the show, I wouldn't have recognized him.

I knew from the few remixes I had heard that their style would probably contain a fair amount of elektro. I have a Drum & Bass remix from them in my collection, and even a remix of a heavy metal song. Would they play their remixes? Would there be vocals? I didn't have any idea what I would hear.

As it turned out, their show was a pretty homogeneous set of solid, dance floor friendly elektro-house. I had a great time and so did about half the crowd who was packed close to the stage on the dance floor for majority of the show. However, for a talented pair who have worked with music from a wide range of artists, I expected to hear more variety.

That isn't, however, a complaint. I am satisfied that I got my money's worth, and it was great to see them play out, and they had the most visually interesting setup I've seen in a small club since Coldcut played there awhile back.

Only regreet: I should have found some ear plugs. Their amps were turned to 11.

Upcoming show: Nikka Costa @ The Independent, Saturday Oct 4