Golden Triangle plays Sound Fix Records
At Sound Fix Records in Brooklyn, free shows are put together every now and then. The place is a small music stop near a less noticeable street corner in Williamsburg between North 11th and Berry Ave.
I arrived at Sound Fix when the Brooklyn based band Golden Triangle got ready to play a free set today to the side of the merchandise counters inside the record store. It was my second time seeing the group play, and although it was different seeing them tonight than when I had seen them a few months ago, I stand by my convictions and say that the music is still amazing and was just as good.
What made tonight’s show different from the first time that I saw the band had much to do with the amount of space Golden Triangle had to play in. When I saw them last it was at Monster Island Basement, which is a bigger place, and an actual music venue in another part of Brooklyn. There, the band was playing their CD release party which signifies even more of an excuse for the band to go nuts. Their instruments spewed excitement, their antics were wild, the crowd loved every minute of it, and I was so intoxicated from dancing that I needed to sit out during a couple of songs.
This show was not that show. At Sound Fix, I actually stood motionless in front of Vashti Windlith and Carly Rabalais, the bands two lead singers, and carefully watched them feed words into their microphones. I actually appreciated the fact that I was able to study the band this time through. It seemed that their behavior was toned down, which seemed to be because they had limited space to move about this time around. But as I looked closer, I realized something that made this band very special: they didn’t play songs together; they played them rather with one another.
Saying that Golden Triangle played “with one another” is not a way over intellectualize another great Rock n’ Roll band. What I mean by that statement is exactly what I saw: The two lead singers Carli and Vashti playing off one another with shouty vocals and voice experimentation (Vashti emulated animal sounds and even used laughter in one of their songs), Alix Brown, the bands bass player in the back corner of the room digging into her Jazzmaster next to drummer Jay Hough who seemed to be both trying hard to keep the beat and getting off on it at the same time.
These are just examples of a great band dynamic; when band members play music together yet also remain their own independence in the process. As I stood watching the Band while note taking, I noticed a women and her little daughter walk up beside me as Golden Triangle played “Noose”. The little girl seemed unsure what she was seeing and hearing, but even so, she laughed when she was welcomed by Carly, who pointed and winked at her right before the song finished, which is when Guitarist O. J. San Felipe yelled “Feliz cuatro de mayo.”
The young mother, a Williamsburg resident, told me how she loves taking her daughter to see this side of New York City, telling me “All of it is what I love about this area in particular. I can take Sasha to see scary or weird stuff still know it’s safe. It’s always a friendly place.”
I had a chance to speak with Band members Vashti and Carli after the show, who told me how they felt about the album review given to them by online website Pitchfork Media. I started off talking to Vashti, who gawked when I asked her about what she claimed to be a “shitty” review pitchfork gave their most recent album, “Double Jointer.” As she put forth that the reviewer, Joe Colly, didn’t have enough experience within music to assess “Double Jointer” in the first place. Vashti then resumed her answer by saying she was “flattered that they were considered weird” as Carly added “we just didn’t agree with what the review said a whole lot.”
