Former denizens of the fertile floodplain of the Pioneer Valley, home to hippies, hipsters and Coco Gordon-Moore, the three-piece has long since fled to the Big Apple where they were promptly assigned an address somewhere in Brooklyn in exchange for just the tiniest bit of their collective soul. At their homecoming on Sunday night passions flared. Things got hot and heavy, and I’m not just talking about the fat guy sporting the hard-on during the gratis belly-dancing performances taking place in the upstairs dining room. Downstairs in the dark batcave of a music space, during a combative set, Mobius displayed all the combustibility of red-headed child star struggling with her first rehab stint, before pulling back from the “dark side” with some ol’ fashioned, rage-swallowin’ moxie.
The foul weather seemed to have found its way indoors as Mobius-roadies decorated the stage with stormclouds, harbingers of misfortune. Singer-bassist, Ben Sterling, offered a forecast a couple songs into the set, “Partly cloudy with a chance of crappy music.” Singer-keyboardist-guitarist, Peter Sax, struck back with a prediction of his own: “…after the show, a boxing match onstage.” The drummer, Noam Schatz, pointedly broke up the ongoing mano a mano by diving headlong into the first measure of the every song.
Ah yes, the music. Mobius has a nice, trim danceable groove that mixes live drums, electric beats, synth and 90’s guitar effects to an occasionally pleasant effect. Performance-wise, they know their chicken. They take themselves seriously like every headliner should. The keyboardist taps out each note like a drunken, full-of-himself gnome hammering out a Christmas present and the bassist scampered about like a Novoselic on Redbull. These two BFFs even pulled off an homage a la Hairmetal, as they leaned back-to-back, stroking their axes furiously during a particularly intense sonic flight. Everyone breathed a sigh of relief at the apparently buried-hatchet until the song ended and the bassist let the crowd in on a secret: “The only reason I lean on him tonight is to get him to expect it every time, so, when he least expects it, I’m going to back off and then- BAM!- he’ll go smack on the ground!”
The scent of blood was in the air but prudence got the better of Mobius. The bassist admitted to being “off his meds” and the rest of the night went by the book. Too bad. A busted, fat lip would have partially excused the “dude-singing-to-himself-in-the-shower” vocal stylings.
A promising Middle Distance Runner opened with an ambitious, magisterial set that, at times, overpowered the underwhelming sound system. Tigercity kept it simple, cranking out minimalist, bass-and-guitar dance numbers piled high with extra helpings of falsetto.
