DEATH SENTENCE: PANDA!
SHEARING PINK
THE MUTATORS
Artists Television Access
Dec. 12, 2007

On the concrete out in front of the Artists Television Access building, beside bicycles chained to parking meters, local noise rock fans drank beers wrapped in paper bags and smoked between sets.

Inside, the room was heavy with sweat as people rocked between the movie theatre chairs bolted to the floor. Someone fell off a chair, someone got pushed backwards and a mosh pit formed. As the third band, the Mutators, reached the loudest point in their set, the audience could barely stay on their feet and soon people were just jumping on one another and the mosh pit became a dog pile. 

The next band was Shearing Pink, from Vancouver. They have a drummer and two guitar players, one who sings. Their sound was heavy and intense, buzzing like the last moments of a heavy metal song stretched out for several minutes over a thrashing drum beat. They spent most of the time chugging through the dense haze of gurgling noise pulsing from their amplifiers, except for one melodic vocal part that came as a relief to the kids who's heads had been in a noise rock vice for the past two hours.

Then something really sweet happened: Death Sentence: Panda! took the floor. The three-piece lineup from San Francisco includes a clarinet played through a fuzzy distortion box, creating a sound that wraps up the room like an electric blanket. The front woman plays a chirping echoing flute and adds high pitched vocals that made visions of sugar plums dance in my head. Her voice and singing style reminded me of a more mellifluous Satomi from Deerhoof. Behind these two, the drummer bounced and rolled his sticks over the snare and toms like a marching band drummer. His drumming matched perfectly with the clarinet and flute to give the songs a big push of spastic momentum, without sounding out of place, as would a more rock oriented drumming technique.

For me, a good deal of the evening's pleasure was derived from the tripped-out cartoons on screen behind the band, especially those that featured tacos and hotdogs growing arms that had more tacos and hotdogs as hands, plus tons of other bizarre and fun videos. Big thanks to the good folks at ATA!  

[Jeff Bissell]

Discuss this review on our Livejournal!

[STREAM] Death Sentence: Panda!: "Island of Sexual Violence"