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Ducktails and The Twerps at 285 Kent

Ducktails / The Twerps
285 Kent
Brooklyn, NY
March 29

As I waited for the doors to open at 285 Kent, the empty warehouse turned DIY music venue literally next door to Brooklyn performance staple Glasslands Gallery, I struck up a conversation with some fellow concert-goers. Many of them had come to see the headliner Ducktails perform, but I did run into a few fans of the Melbourne, Australia indie-pop band The Twerps.

The band, which is a typical 4-piece setup (2 guitars, bass, and drums), took the stage just 20 minutes before midnight to warm up the crowd. Vocalist Martin Frawley shared guitar duty with Jules McFarlane and seemed to be the most excited out of the band to be playing for the group of 20-somethings that had gathered at the space. After a respectable 40 minute set, including a new song that Jules had written, The Twerps ended the night with their chilled out break-up anthem “Who Are You” that nearly had the audience singing along.

“We’re excited to play because we don’t get to play that often,” said Ducktails’ mastermind/guitarist Matthew Mondanile to the crowded audience at 285 Kent. Due to the success of Real Estate’s critic-approved sophomore album Days – on which Mondanile plays guitar – his lo-fi side-project Ducktails has been put on the back-burner, but the Ducks showed no signs of aging as they took the stage and proceeded to shower the room with their own brand of psych-tinged pop melodies.

Although Mondanile records solo as Ducktails, the set-up that night consisted of his full-on band of five members with two guitars, bass, keys/synth, and drums. Anticipation for the group was at its peak when Ducktails started playing at 12:31am. The set, which relied heavily upon Ducktails’ 2010 release Arcade Dynamics, did not disappoint. The band laid down the music’s signature vibe of repeated synth melodies and ambient noise that created a blank palette for Mondanile’s experimental guitar picking. Halfway into the set Ducktails introduced a new work-in-progress song. The as-of-yet untitled work started out with a groovy bass line before the lo-fi, fuzzed-out guitars and reverb-laden vocals fluttered on top. The show ended with the crowd favorite “Landrunner”, a minimal jam from the 2009 album Landscapes, which left the audience floating down a hazy river.