Tapes'N'Tapes

Tapes ‘N’ Tapes walked on stage full of energy and confidence, waving to the crowd and smiling, smiling, smiling. These somewhat nerdy men from Minneapolis were fresh from a great show at Meredith and were ready to go urban.

The start of the set can only be described as sounding like the little known genre (one I may have indeed just made up)… indie-funk! And the rest of the set continued in gene-swinging fashion. They flowed easily between indie pop, jazz, new nu wave and balls to the wall rock’n’roll but kept the core sound that is Tapes’N’Tapes. And the tightness of their playing was truly impressive. They were locked in so tight, especially during 'In Houston', that my head almost popped! Well that may be going over the top but they were very tight.

The whole time they radiated confidence. They just had that look in their eyes that they meant business. They were serious about having fun playing really good music. As the set rolled on they continued to impress, with creative harmonies showing how they manage to incorporate their voices as instruments. Not just focused on singing lyrics but more on making notes and noises. They emanated a series of vocal expressions that can only be described as “poppin and a’hollerin”.

The songs of Tapes’N’Tapes had most of the normal rock’n’roll standard breakdowns, middles 8s, middle 4s, oohs and ahhs, all inclusive but all done with greater intelligence and creativity than most bands I have seen. Their stage presence was also very impressive. All four members never closed their mouths during the whole show. They had both intense concentration and nonchalance of true pros. The keyboard player went off on little excursions around the stage when he wasn’t playing his sometimes grinding sometimes bleeping and blooping keys. He bounced around hitting cymbals and bumping into his band mates with a healthy amount of infectious goofy abandon. The whole time, especially towards the end of the gig, the band was like a spinning top that wobbled a bit but never halted until the encore-less finish.

In summary.. a band of nice guys with really good songs, played extremely well with top notch tightness, energy and a real sense of fun. A great live experience.

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