In Synesthesia: Kishi Bashi amazes at Union Transfer

Kishi Bashi | Photo by Rocco Peditto | roccopeditto.virb.com

“It’s funny, you know?” said K Ishibashi on Wednesday night, “I used to be the best violinist in the Kishi Bashi Band.” The sold-out audience laughed uproariously, which caused K to chuckle a bit and look down abashedly. Now that he’s on tour with a string quartet—which features a professor of music—the former Of Montreal collaborator turned violin/beatbox/looping maestro is learning to share the limelight of his celebrated live shows.

It seems like just yesterday that I was shivering outside the Church in the February chill, waiting faithfully to see K for the first time. That basement show is now two years behind, and Wednesday night’s UT show marks the fourth or fifth time I’ve seen him in that span—it’s addicting. The roller coaster ride of rising and falling violin loops, woven masterfully with haunting lyrics spun in interchangeable Japanese and English is a thrill ride that begs to be taken over and over again. And seeing the sold-out crowd at the seated Union Transfer was fantastic. Ishibashi knows that his fans here are loyal—he ran through all the Philly venues that he’s played over the years, thanking those who’d seen multiple shows: The TLA, The Church upstairs and down, and the Fire.

But there’s something different than all of those other shows that I’ve seen K at, before—and I don’t just mean the world class string quartet arranged on the stage. Throughout the evening, he walked an interesting line between his normal, lighthearted self, and the intensely serious and focused conductor for the string quartet. Some moments, he would have trouble starting a song or getting a loop right because he was laughing so hard—and reiterated at several times through the evening that “I’m not high, just having a great time”— while others, he would muse quietly that “This are really the way I imagined these songs should rightfully be played, I’m glad that you can be a part of this.”

Working his way through a setlist that spanned his two full-length albums, and an EP series featuring covers of Beirut (a Sunday Smile) and Talking Heads (This Must Me The Place), K wowed and charmed the audience. Although most of the set was dedicated to showcasing the new, re-arranged versions of his songs for string quartet, K would occasionally take up his own violin and kick things into high gear.

Of particular note was the guest appearances from Mike Savino (aka Tall Tall Trees), longtime Kishi Bashi band member and collaborator. Savino wields a luminous banjo—dubbed the Banjotron—with alternating finesse and sheer throwdown, adding not only twangy strings to K’s mix, but also percussion. Yes, on a banjo.

On “The Ballad of Mr. Steak,” Ishibashi broke free from the mic stand, capering about the stage and inciting the seated audience to not only stand, but dance. And dance, they did, with those in the front row coming right up to the stage to jam with K and Trees as they gave the otherwise dignified show a highlight of raucous, unbridled joy.

After coming back for an encore, K, the string quartet and Savino wrapped up the night by playing a sprawling, entirely acoustic version of “Bright Whites,” while the audience left their aisles and surged forward, returning Union Transfer to it’s typical standing room environment.

As a recurrent fan of K, I’ve gotta say that I admire the way that he’s handling this tour. It seems like maybe he hasn’t quite figured out every detail yet—and that’s okay.As brilliant as a flawless, no-missed-note solo set from him can be, it’s really interesting to see him setting that aside in favor of something else, equally brilliant, but maybe a bit more zany in a way that even he couldn’t have accounted for. Even if he’s no longer the most formally talented violinist on the stage, we’ll always love Kishi Bashi.