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Paard van Troje, The Hague, The Netherlands
January 27th 2006
Chicks on Speed & Kid Ginseng

It seemed like all of Den Haag's nouveaux art had run out of their safe houses into one of the oldest pop venues of the Netherlands. Somehow the fact that a band starts to create fashion with some local fashion students has dragged in people who would otherwise never go to these kind of concerts. Good promotion made sure that the venue was quite filled up for what could be something really special.


Kid Ginseng

If you have never heard of this artist and live outside the USA, you shouldn't be too worried. He's one of the New York underground gems or maybe even legends. A session musician since he was 15 while most of us are only chasing girls and boys at that age. He never performed outside the USA, releasing his music all by himself (except his brand new album Blessé). His MySpace website is quite a success with over 10,000 visits, but it was time for this underground musician to go above ground and La La Land Records (his record label) has persuaded him to do so, quite an achievement. You might want to go check him out if you missed this concert, just try MySpace! http://www.myspace.com/kidginseng

Music
Get some serious turntablism, some beats and a guy who is adding some sometimes very distorted vocals to it. It may sound like simplicity but in fact it did just sound right. Nothing like the everyday disco related music these turn table specialists normally make but closer to the noise that can be found in EBM and industrial music. Heavy distortion some clean beats and vocals, nothing seemed out of place. The mix was very simple but effective. A guy, a turn table and a mixer, what can go wrong? Nothing really: electropunk at full speed!



Performance
Hello Kid, we're here! No right in front of you! It seems like Kid Ginseng is deep into his own world and doesn't seem to really bother about a kinky performance. He's walking up and down the stage, making some pulsating moves with his arms every now and then. Walking back to his turn table or just turning around at the end of the stage to walk back again. His hair in front of his face almost all the time adds to the fact the audience hardly gets to interact with him personally. Most people just gasp or dance to the music, nobody was here to see a thrilling show, they want good music. With flashing red and white lights and occasional green the lights fit the sober performance. He can't be captured, he's that guy who seems to be only interested in bringing his music across and he does that very well.
Rating
Music: 8
Performance: 6
Sound: 8
Light: 6
Total: 7



Chicks on Speed

Take three women who met at the Munich art academy and have them form a band. Alex Murray-Leslie, Melissa Logan en Kiki Moorse are what they call Chicks on Speed. A band which already managed to gather quite a bit of fans by now and even managed to get themselves on Mtv. Not bad for artists who are obviously this alternative. The venue has filled up even more during the support act, the curious and the fans, all mix well in the crowd. 

Music
If you expect a musical treat you'd be very disappointed here. These women just have a huge problem getting some decent vocals out. The songs are most certainly not the most complex although getting three vocal lines mixed live isn't that easy. Repeating words or phrases the women try to compensate their lack of singing talents with ridiculous enthusiasm. It seems like the band has a fetish for the obscure and funny props, they turn wrenches into percussion and use low quality toys as instruments. But besides that there's a real saxophone and some hi-tech electronic instruments. It's hard to describe everything they use during their show without turning the review into a very boring piece of writing. The band plays all their hits like 'We Don't Play Guitars', 'Fashion Rules', '99 Cents', 'Mind Your Own Business' and 'Wordy Rappinghood' which seems to get the crowd going and pleased. The sound mix was messy, but it somehow suited the show, some instruments just hardly came through at times but nobody really cared. If you forget about complex and multi-layered music for a while, and let yourself drift off on their performance you might even enjoy it.



Performance
Those of you out there who don't follow the rules of fashion should be happy. If what the Chicks were wearing would be fashion most people would probably consider nudism isn't such a bad option. With all these outrageous neon colours it seems like the 80's are back but like in a very bad nightmare. Dressed as they are the girls are running around on stage all the time, they are vivid, no they seem to have ADHD! But their constant activity makes sure the show stayed remarkably interesting. A real props galore you could say with sewing machines, cleaning tools, shopping charts. The girls just grab you attention and if you manage to break free it's because of the big video screen in the back showing all sorts of apparently random images and carefully selected photos all depending on the songs. During the '99 Cents' the whole screen is just flooded with red prize tags while at other times parts of the lyrics appear on the big screen. During the whole show there's plenty of light, traditional and of course black light to show the neon details on their clothes. Never a dull moment, and if there is a moment of relative silence it seems there just something new just around the corner. The band leaves for a bit only to return and end with a huge fashion show in their own style. Lots of fashion students flood the stage to have their fashion orgy. But if what they are wearing is the result of 2 days of designing it seems like there might be a fashion career out there for all of us.

Rating
Music: 6
Performance: 7
Sound: 6
Light: 7
Total: 7



More photos on page 2

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