Main Stage - Live at Primavera Sound, Barcelona

Deerhunter

Kranky, Atlanta, Georgia

Deerhunter creates songs in a psychophysical multitrack stream-of-consciousness rush and then played endlessly on tour until they are stripped of anything resembling feeling. Sometimes obsessed with sparseness and sometimes yearning to blow the shitty venue's subs. Deerhunter's most compelling asset is its penchant for unpredictability. No two performances are the same, yet the group's cerebral fingerprint shines through its constantly morphing presentations. Deerhunter balances earth-rattling drones with angelic cadences that dwell on the borders of coherent song structure, and it utilizes the blank spaces inside the notes, which leaves plenty of room to roam around a wash of graceful guitar noise, clutter and kraut-rock rhythms. Its competent take on less-than-orthodox sounds blossomed in only a few short years from lo-fi, "kitchen avant-garde" home recordings to a viable tenant of the pop avant-garde that gives a nod to everyone from Rhys Chatham to Stereolab.