Noise Not Music

Raccoo-oo-oon, Cars, IBLY.DY @ The Red House, 11/3

As with a lot of Noise bands, it's hard to describe what IBLY.DY sound like. In fact I'm not even sure that's what they're called. They were giving out sheet music and set lists which suggest that's what they're called. I can tell you that there were two guys, both of which looked like typical World Of Warcraft players (long hair, plaited beards, shorts and fleeces). One played an electronic drum set, a bass guitar and a tape machine. The other played a didgeridoo. The highlight of their set was finding out they had a song called "Why I Cannot Forgive Daryl Palumbo For Breaking His Edge".
After this, we got treated to two different guys playing drums and various percussive instruments, including a wok. There was some violin bow on cymbal action, which works surprisingly well. They were both good drummers, but who wants to watch someone play drums for 30 minutes?
Raccoo-oo-oon are proof that Noise bands are better when they rock. Despite the presence of saxophone, keyboards and tables full of effects pedals, they were best when they picked up their guitars and rocked out. Judging by the headbanging in the audience, most people would probably agree. Not that Raccoo-oo-oon's more ambient stuff wasn't good, because it was; it was just that compared to the big rock numbers they started and finished with, it seemed to be lacking energy. But then, if you didn't have the bit that sucked, it would make the bit that rocked, rock less.