The first disappointing thing was that no one was wearing a
costume. Not in the audience—plenty of good getups
there—but onstage. Sure, Broadcast and Atlas Sound were here on
tour, and maybe it’s hard to get a costume together on the road, but
c’mon. You’d think Atlas Sound frontman Bradford Cox would at
least put on one of his old dresses or something. But no.
He wasn’t entirely without the holiday spirit, though. “Who’s got
the best costume?” he asked between songs. “Tiger? You’re just wearing
a striped shirt!”
He spotted a girl dressed up as an apple with a worm poking out of
it, asked her onstage, and awarded her free merch after the show for
winning the first round of this impromptu costume contest. “That’s the
best costume I’ve ever seen.”
Beyond the lack of costumes, it turns out that Atlas Sound and
Broadcast—while certainly spooky—were kind of a bad
match for Halloween. Both bands put on a fine show, but both were
pretty subdued, making alternately formless or just mellow music. Even
“Walkabout,” the poppiest, friendliest thing on Atlas Sound’s recent
Logos, was played at a somnolent half-speed, despite the band’s
occasionally energetic dual drummers, in what felt like an obvious
missed opportunity to kick things up a bit. The whole set was kind of
limp and noodly, and it all sounded like watching a band play in a fish
tank (though not always in a bad way). The mood just didn’t seem to
click with the relatively ramped-up, ready-to-party crowd.
Cox admitted as much with his winking, between-song banter.
After the twangy, junkie-cowboy number “Criminals,” Cox joked about
switching things up “before we get too Austin City Limits… don’t
think I don’t know.”
“Did you think this was gonna be spooky?” he asked. “Me, too, but I
can only be myself. I was born spooky, but I’ve recently become less
spooky…”
Cox asked the audience, “Trick or treat?” and provided one of each:
a rousing run through the morbid but upbeat “Shelia” and a rendition of
Broadcast’s “Tears in the Typing Pool,” aided by that band’s Trish
Keenan.
Cox told a story about teaching Kim Deal how to replay one of her
own songs, concluding, “We’re gonna do ‘Cannonball’ by the Breeders
now—I wish. Just more melancholy bullshit.” After which
they actually played a winningly ascending jam before ending with the
downer “Attic Lights.”
Broadcast burned through my goodwill for them with like 30
minutes of ambient noise and spooky sound effects, made slightly
interesting by the strobing eyeball mandala projected on a video screen
behind them and by the detachment of Keenan’s voice from her physical
form by way of looping and delay (voices detached from forms =
hauntology!). Still, when they finally kicked into the catchy, songlike
“Corporeal,” with its drum-machine snare crack, bass guitar, and
buzzing synths, the screen switching to saturated color for what looked
like an endless zoom through a brain’s synaptic connections, I
was spent. Hearing Truckasauras echoing out of the Havana parking lot
as I left made me think I may have missed the better Halloween party,
hauntology be damned. 
I generally agree with this review, though I think it understates just how exhaustingly boring Broadcast’s 30-minute droning introductory “song” was. Dozens of people left before they played a song with actual words. My friends who saw them play in Portland the next night say they didn’t get the spooky treatment, but that they were bored nonetheless.
I was at the Portland show. Atlas Sound was really good. Sounds like they woke up a bit from the Halloween show. Broadcast was totally awesome but not necessarily in the way you or I might like them to be. I definitely did miss the ‘tunes’. I didn’t catch their last record, The Future Crayon and the last time I saw them live was also in Portland at the same venue, The Doug Fir Lounge, on the Tender Buttons tour. This show cannot be compared to the one I saw then. They had a drummer and basically put on one of the best shows I’d ever seen. The music went into me. It was throbbing and visceral but also extremely tuneful. This time around they still had the throbbing thing but just not much in the way of tunes. ‘Corporeal’ was an obvious exception. Everything came together for that and I was really hoping for more in that vein. Alas, it was not to be. Still, I’m a huge fan and I support them in their quest for pure art. At least they’re pushing their own limits.
I completely agree with your review of the show. Atlas’ set was completely energyless, and the 20+ minute broadcast drone was a huge disappointment. Once Broadcast’s set got started proper, I was please with their set up. Their new song “in here the world begins” was excellent and a really cool addition to the classic tracks you and other commentators mentioned.
I absolutely love Broadcast, but literally every new album they’ve come out with over the past 8 years has seen the loss of a founding band member, leaving only the original vocalist and bassist(?). Each album also suffers accordingly in its reviews and reception. At this rate they’ll probably lose Trish, and then what will be left?
I think the band is now riding on (deserved) notoriety, but their shows aren’t what they used to be.