The Field/The Juan Maclean @ Double Door

I had the good fortune of a friend checking out The Juan Maclean and The Field play at the Double Door a few days ago. A bit of luck definitely played a part in me catching this show, as I had no idea either band was in town until the night before the show, when a friend asked me to check out the show with them. Given my previously mentioned appreciation of The Juan Maclean, I was already excited for the show…then I found out the day of the show that The Field was on the bill as well, and it became "can't miss" status. His abbreviated set during the Pitchfork Music Festival a few years back was one of the highlights of the entire festival in my opinion, and anyone who's followed this blog for any period of time can probably judge my level of fandom by the constant posts. On top of all of this, I'd yet to go to the Double Door once in the years I've lived in Chicago, which is a goddamn shame quite frankly. So yeah, no excuses…I basically had to go, right? Here's a summation of my thoughts of the night.

The Field

Considering that The Field's presence on the bill was what ultimately sold me on the night, it goes without saying that coming in my expectations were pretty high. By the end of his set, I was more than satisfied with their set, but not in the manner I initially expected to be wowed. In hindsight, it makes sense. I had first seen The Field at a summer music festival, and accordingly, he played a very 4/4, breezy, accessible, set made for dancing. This time, the set up was as an opening act in a rock club with some live instrumentation accompanying Axel Willner on stage. The situation was much more conducive to experimentation, and the result was indeed a more varied, experimental set from Axel...one better suited to head-nodding outright dancing. As I stated earlier, not what I was expecting…but is that such a bad thing? I was more than okay with it, and given that one of the complaints levied against The Field is the lack of versatility in the sound (bullshit in my opinion), I loved his desire to branch out even more. Good stuff, but feel free to play at Smart Bar and get us all moving anytime you feel sir.

The More That I Do - The Field

The Juan Maclean

Boy, if there ever was an example of quality pounding the shit out of quantity it was this set. Relying on my feeble memory, I don't think The Juan Maclean played more than 8 songs last night…but they nailed EVERY SINGLE ONE (save for a minor hiccup at the beginning of "Give Me Every Little Thing"). Like labelmates LCD Soundsystem, The Juan Maclean happens to be one of those electronic dance bands whose sound translates really, really well as a live band. Easily the high point of the night was the three-song climax of "Give Me Every Little Thing" into "One Day" into an absolutely epic version of "Happy House" that lasted at least 20 minutes and turned the audience in front of them into an impromptu nightclub dancefloor. If video of this event appears (they were filming the set), please believe it'll be thrown up on Oh, Sweet Nothing. It was something that had to be experienced to believe, but seeing it will probably be pretty rad too.

So yeah, nothing too deep here…I expected a great show, I got a great show. Possibly my favorite consequence of attending is that I finally have an excuse to post "Happy House" for your listening pleasure. How was this so slept on last year??

The Juan Maclean - "Happy House" (zShare)