Kirstiecat | Blog

(Tomorrow Never Knows Festival)
Schubas 1/12/6

The first time I saw Tenki was about five years ago. It was one of the first shows I had seen in Chicago. They were opening up for Dressy Bessy at the time. I ended up wanting to leave early during Dressy Bessy’s set because it was such a disappointment after seeing Tenki, a band whose dynamics and stage presence really blew me away even though I had never even heard of them before that point.

It’s difficult for me to describe Tenki’s sound. The guitar and bass interplay along with the pedal effects, Roland keyboard playing, and trumpeting work together in a way that certainly separate them from your standard indie rock band. At times the pedal effects remind me a touch of Spoon but the lead singer Jamie Toal’s voice is a little different. It’s edgy raw and emotional and fits perfectly to the oft accompanying horns. The band has a certain energy both on stage and on album that give the sense of urgency. Tenki’s View of an Orbiting Man does not disappoint. Take “Lucky” for example. It’s a song with such nice soaring trumpets and bridges to an edgy dark chorus. “Kiss of Millions” has a more Spoon feel where the repetitive guitar melody in the beginning really hooks you in. Toal sings in a slightly more falsetto in the beginning, demonstrating a nice vocal range. The almost hypnotic string of lyrics about “trying to remember where I put my mind” with an alternating catchy chorus with supporting horns work well together in “Croupier,” which ends the album perfectly.

I’ve been awaiting their newest release: “We’re Not Talking About The Universe Are We…” for a long time but talking to one of the band members, I received the impression that they want to schedule the release closer to when they will all be available for a tour. Look for it mid Spring. You can listen to songs from it off of their web page as well as songs from their other two releases here

Click for more pictures

These guys are like guitar gods I swear. I have so many great pictures of them together perfectly posed as if in a photo shoot. Except this is the way these guys are naturally, which almost boggles the mind. You get the feeling when they do the dishes they still end up looking this cool. Okay…so I can’t really picture them doing the dishes.

In a way, Jamie Toal’s side profile kind of reminds me of a skinny young Morrissey, if Morrissey were a Chicagoan and born later obviously.

One of the trumpeters wore a bunny suit for part of the time. How fun!

This entry was posted on Saturday, January 14th, 2006 at 12:33 pm and is filed under music. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.