Local Music

LOCAL MUSIC
By Neil Dixon Smith

At the Beach with the Mini-Systems

Last month the Beach People performed at the increasingly vital Club Heidelberg, and it was a prototypical moment of Ann Arbor Rock. For those of you without a scorecard, the Beach People are yet another permutation of the Mini-Systems (itself of Nautical Almanac and Salivation Army Marching Band pedigree).

The Mini-Systems gained some local notoriety last summer after a series of now legendary performances on WCBN's Psychological Talk Show, as well as for the scattershot release (on Hanson records) of dozens of 45rpm players pressed on used compact discs. Yes, you heard me, pressed on CDs! They discovered that with an old-fashioned Dictaphone machine you could cut sound grooves on the digital discs just as you could on small plates of vinyl. Packaged in 5-inch floppy disc jackets, this contribution to world culture should garner them a Nobel Prize, but usually the most civic attention they receive is getting hassled by Ann Arbor cops.

Club shows for the Mini-Systems have been rare and often frustrating due to confused soundmen, but at the Club Heidelberg they had a sympathetic promoter (who had them logically segue between Flashpaper and Gravitar) and friend Billy on the knobs. Had you been there, here's what you would have seen:

To help simulate beach-like conditions, house lights were turned on. On stage were two plastic-banded fold-out chaise lounge recliners, underneath large and powerfully bright studio lights (think sunlamps), occupied by the Mini-Systems' Ynot and Etan, and surrounded by a colorful gaggle of surgically altered amplifiers, estranged keyboards, electronic mayhem and microphones. The large television was stage left. Ynot and Etan were dressed in tight-Ts and short shorts, not unlike silent-film era bathing suits. Similarly dressed was White Girl, who stood on the floor in front of the stage across from a small cadre of sunglassed extras who sat in a semi-circle on the floor smoking cigarettes, drinking beer and chatting amongst themselves.

Pre-show rumors had it they would sit up there and listen to the radio, ultimately to be attacked by an alien monster from Chicago. But after requisite pronouncements of "We are the Beach People," it was pretty much a Mini-Systems show. Loud, though not unpleasant, streams of chaotic electronica were intersected by overdriven demonstraron beats, and not often enough enhanced by Ynot and Etan's party calis and hilarious dub poetry. Soon the TV carne on to a homemade performance video, which really rounded out the color scheme and inspired thought-provoking audience-wide discussions about intertextuality. White Girl shimmied and smiled. Bootleggers were given full access. It went on for about an hour.

An hour.

For veterans of this kind of thing, it was actually a pretty short set. All things considered, it really wasn't even that much of a show, not much movement, kinda gong-worthy, and if you think it all sounds just a bit ridiculous, well, consider this: there were about 50 people there, unable to hear the sound of their own voices, who either sat staring in amused contentment at their tables or stood enthusiastically throughout, jockeying to get a better view. Arguably tedious, but this is what we came for. I even busted out of work an hour early to make sure I got there on time.

There is something about the Mini-Systerns that makes incredible sense, and without being precious about it, I can't help but feel that at this moment they best embody the essence of Ann Arbor music, or should I say, Ann Arbor culture. With all due respect to our excellent cache of singer/songwriters, pop rockers and space jammers, when it comes to the attestation of the legacy of Holyland stooge sacrament, the Mini-Systems represent.

First, all respect must be due to them for sheer persistence alone. Under many names and guises, these guys have been doing this now for years. While many other "more important" acts have come and gone, they demonstrate a steady methodicalness that can only come from the deepest level of commitment. They are not an art class exercise for the dada unit; the MiniSystems are for real, whether you like it or not.

Second, they actually make you think about actual ideas. In a wealthy town obsessed to inertia with the accessorizing of information and the technologizing of efficiency, individual effort becomes a joke; life has already happened. Whereas the musical archetype of the hard-working blue collar town is the hard-working blues band, the archetype of the wealthy college town has become the OJ, who performs his software, or the singer songwriter, who smartly confesses feeling pain in the land of plenty. The Mini-Systems are a parody of both, enjoying themselves amid the pointless excess, doing it for the hell of it. Being genuinely nice people.

And they are genuinely entertaining. Like the best electronic music, you have to forgo a pop sense of time and tension and wait for the good parts, but they do come, I swear, though theirs is definitely a post-overload aesthetic. A dub of urban noise pollution. Super extended dancemix. Evidence. ■