Wow, what can I say. “Blown away” would be a could place to start in attempting to describe the experience of a Dan Deacon gig.
I had heard some of his music a few months back and couldn’t get enough of it. I missed the show he piut on last time he was in town but was sure to get myself on down to Whelans on Wexford St to witness one of these spectacular shows. Your Only Massive did a great warm up for Dan and got the crowd to shake their cool away in reference to people who are “too cool” to dance. Luckily I had located mysself on the balcony so was kinda excused! It’s not that I don’t dance, it just well, you know… I’ve gotta be really into it or someone on the dancefloor! Anyway I wished I was down there in the thick of it for this gig. It was fantastic. It was great to see a level of crowd interaction with and artist like this, it is certainly something new and unique. Dan inspires you to get on down, have a laugh and be part of a crowd. He sets up on the floor as opposed to the stage and gets people to get in close. He controls all the lighting for his set-up and the lighting is about as basic as it gets. A glow in the dark skull and a spotlight that are synced with the music provide all the light needed and also create the atmosphere to keep the crowd engaged.

So here I present to you a little video clip of the night. It is ten minute quick cut of Dan Deacon’s amazing show in Dublin on December 2nd 2007. The audio quality is awful from the digital camera i was using so please don’t take that as an indication of the sound quality. The camera just doesn’t like the bass! The sound was fantastic (spot on Gerry!)… the atmosphere was electric. Dan is the Man.

There was lots more good footage but it’s best to keep it short here as the sound quality does not do it justice. A good idea maybe would be to turn down the video sound and listen to a better audio recording by Dan over it. I also took a small number of photos, the best of which is above, check out the rest on my flickr.

So here’s the video…

and the music video for Crystal Cat…

Nialler9 has posted about both shows, so head on over there and check out his reviews and some courtesy mp3s.
There is a great interview / podcast over at The Sound Of Young America that you should check out too