Sympathy for the angels

Poor Bianca. I'm sure she would have preferred to be messing around in someone's living room, perhaps making music with her friends in any case, but without the distraction and existential torture of the Moods audience. It was immediately obvious she wanted to be elsewhere: she hid from the crowd underneath an over-sized meshback truckers' cap, and behind caked bronze makeup...

She frequently hid behind her turned back as well — she never interacted with the audience, in spite of the star-lust filled screams of the first five rows, and by the time some silly drunk girls decided to flash their mobile phone cameras at her instead of just enjoying the show she was cranky enough to yell something at them and give up on us completely. I'm sure the girl in the front row with "rainbowwarrior" painted on her chest cried a bitter tear of disappointment into her pillow later in the evening.

The whole evening I felt sorry for Bianca. She was clearly having fun being on the stage with her sister and her friends, but she looked so miserable about being exposed to us when all we wanted was to join in a bit of fun with her. I kept wondering whether Sierra's obvious engagement with the crowd was pushing her sister further and further off-stage, but maybe I'm projecting too much.

The music, of course, was impeccable. They employed fewer noise-makers than for La maison de mon rêve or Noah's Ark, relying more on Sierra's beautiful, delicate harp and the contrast of Bianca's eerie blood-filled voice. Sierra gave her own operatic vocal chords release in one or two tracks, notably in the powerful (and disturbing) sing-along Japan. I was continually astounded by how faithful their sound was to their latest release (The Adventures of Ghosthorse and Stillborn). Then I realised why: the beats, plus some of the stranger vocal effects (think "singing into a fan") are all provided by the incredible respiratory tract of Tez.

Tez performed a solo warm-up just prior to CocoRosie. I confess to being a beatbox novice, but the sounds coming out of this lanky man in rainbow Reeboks blew me away. And as a support for CocoRosie's music, his organic yet slightly twisted beats are a perfect complement.

Rio En Medio didn't have an easy time of it though. This wasn't your usual, sedate Moods crowd, all bowties and sitting quietly. The bar was a little rowdy, and Danielle StechHomsy found it tough to push her quiet and funky folk music through the noise and smoke. The enthusiastic front rows were willing to forgive her anything, though.

We walked home along the Hardbrücke viadukt in the cool night air, between the silos and across the swirling Limmat, home to warmth and dark in our little treehouse.

Photo credit

CocoRosie by Alex Wright. (cc 2.0) by-nc