|
Dengue Fever, Chicha Libre
Five fedoras and a cowboy hat took the stage first at Johnny Brenda’s in Fishtown. The Brooklyn band known as Chicha Libre mixes ’60s psychedelic surf-rock and Chicha, a Peruvian movement from the same era that employs various percussion instruments, accordions, bass guitars and flutes. Singer/guitarist Oliver Conan played a tiny guitar called a cuatro, which is a traditional instrument of Chicha music resembling a ukulele. Even on a Monday night after a holiday weekend, it was difficult to sit still during Chicha Libre’s set. Some songs had a Middle Eastern-meets-Southwestern feel. “I feel like I’m riding a horse,” commented one audience member during “El Borrachito,” which was reminiscent of “Rawhide.” Many of Chicha Libre’s songs sounded like they belonged on ’60s surf-movie soundtracks; you can just imagine Gidget hanging 10 to “Six Pieds Sous Terre” from debut album Sonido Amazonico, which was released in March. After Chicha Libre’s set, percussionist Greg Burrows—who’d just rocked seemingly every percussion instrument that’s ever been on a stage, including one that looked like a large baguette—sat at the bar waiting to hear headliners Dengue Fever. “Oliver got together with me and expressed his interest in Chicha music and we started playing in his bar in New York, Barbés, as a once a week thing,” Burrows told MAGNET. “That’s how we got started.” Chhom Nimol, lead vocalist of Dengue Fever, captivates the audience from the moment she steps on stage. The young vocalist, who comes from a famous musical family in Cambodia, has a voice so pure and expressive that you can grasp the meaning of her lyrics even if you don’t speak a lick of Khmer. Brothers Zac (vocals/guitar) and Ethan Holtzman (Farfisa organ) along with Senon Williams (bass), David Ralicke (brass) and Paul Smith (drums) formed Dengue Fever after hoarding ’60s Cambodian pop records and then auditioning for a lead singer. They found Nimol singing in a club in a Cambodian section of Long Beach, California. Funky, Bootsy Collins-esque bass lines, sexy snake-charmer brass trills, psychedelic Farfisa organ and Nimol’s soaring vocals create a thrilling sound. Nimol’s voice spans an incredible vocal range hitting notes in her head or falsetto voice that are so expressive they’re surprising to hear. This Cambodian style of singing can fade in and out of notes in octaves in high registers and then drop down to a sort of yodeling sound. Dengue Fever’s songs (such as the upbeat “Sni Bong”) make you want to move, and alarmingly tall bassist Williams and guitarist Zac frequently hopped up and down in unison onstage. Even slower tracks such as “Sober Driver” and “Tiger Phone Card,” both sung in English, have shimmy-worthy beats and witty lyrics. On “Tiger Phone Card,” Holtzman and Nimol croon back and forth about a long-distance relationship, Nimol shooting back to Holtzman with a tsk-tsk finger wag, “You only call me when you’re drunk, I can tell it in your voice/It’s the only time that you open up to me and tell me that you love me.” “I’m so happy!” Nimol beamed after the show, lifting her hair off her neck to display a homemade beaded necklace just given to her by a fan. “I was worried on a Monday night that it would not be very crowded but I am so happy to be in Philly,” said Nimol. After the encore, friends and iPhone-toting fans rushed the backstage exit and climbed up onstage with the band to take pictures. The audience was so taken with the down-to-earth Dengue Fever that people lingered around Johnny Brenda’s in a kind of stupor. —Cristina Perachio |