Show Report: Xeno & Oaklander/Plague Drone @ Joshua Tree, 12/10/2024

Catching one of the best sets of the year in the middle of nowhere

Dec 11, 2024

U2 was wrong about a lot of things, including that the streets in Joshua Tree do, in fact, have names.1 And if you head 15 miles down one towards the middle of nowhere and survive the five additional miles of washboard off-roading, you will happen upon a DIY venue that looks like a Mendel splice between a truck depot and a church. Once you step inside, you'll find a spartan space with an eight-foot skeleton and an appropriately sized mega couch for said skeleton. Oh, that room? The skeleton enclosure? It has the best acoustics I've experienced this year. It's like discovering that your unassuming coworker has studied the blade and, against all odds, is actually sick with it. Never judge a book, I guess.

The artists filling that room with sound were Plague Drone, the dark ambient/power electronics project of the promoter, and Xeno & Oaklander, the cult minimal wave/synth pop duo all the way from Brooklyn. Since both acts were acolytes of the analog, it was, as you might expect, a night where there would be more patch cables than people. However, the few souls who made it out to shiver in an unheated space while the California desert's temperatures dropped into the twenties2 were treated to a killer show.

Plague Drone plays stuff I love live but never get a chance to listen to much when left to my own devices, an embarrassing admission considering I used to run a tape label that released this kind of material. Backed by an unsettling projection of surrealist figures in various throes of suffering, Plague Drone pumped up the volume, using a nifty rig ("microKORG, Roland JUNO alpha 2, and various modelers," one supposes from reading liner notes) to create sweeping swaths of ambiance and pulsating drones. My favorite stuff was when he locked into an industrial groove, pounding the audience into a paste with the wumpf thumpf of 10-ton beats. The title track to his 2022 album, Vessel Departure, was the primo crusher of the set. With the sound reverberating off the walls and creating a sound bath, getting squashed rarely feels this good. I bought a shirt. The shirt is sick.

Said shirt plus cat fur that attached itself upon entry into my house. Do you dare me to wear this to [Ozzy voice] therapyyyyyyyyy?

Here's where we talk about the sound. Hot damn. How the engineer dialed in the room is incredible considering the supposed limitations of the space. As a new show acquaintance said, You know you're going to be in for some expert knob-twiddling when the sound guy is standing in the middle of the crowd, busily fidgeting with an iPad. Still, what a miracle. Someone else I met said it was the rare show you could remove your earplugs and still appreciate the volume without getting slayed by the ear-wrecking high frequencies endemic at venues that hire people who don't quite know how to EQ.

And there's probably no better recipient of that immaculate sound shaping than Xeno & Oaklander, the two-piece of Liz Wendelbo and Sean McBride. As you know from my Cosey Mueller infatuation (purely platonic, don't be gross), I am a sucker for some analog synth wizardry that leans into Euro-style 'choose your own adventure'-wave. And that's precisely what we got: highly danceable beats backing sawing synths that could only slice a smile across your face.

Here's the thing you might not expect from Xeno & Oaklander: For a band that is synth-based, it is engrossing as heck. Watching McBride work is spellbinding as the musician burns up a ton of calories, seemingly setting up drum fills on the fly and switching between channels to create a layered sound that, if you closed your eyes, you could easily mistake for, like, five people on the stage à la Kraftwerk or Space. Meanwhile, Wendelbo owns the stage, utilizing a goth-cum-chanson lullaby voice that stokes the general dreaminess of the material. (McBride's vocals provide a nice contrast — a stentorian, Peter Murphy-y flip.) And the new material sounds great. I've been privy to a few sets this year that have unlocked an album for me, and I have a far greater appreciation for X&O's new album, Via negativa (In the Doorway Light), after coming out the other side of this show.

Speaking of coming out the other side, holy hell, was it cold outside the venue. After saying my protracted goodbyes, I hoofed it to the car like Jack Torrance and immediately booted up the heater. On the long drive home, I thought two things: (1) what a show, and (2) I'd sacrifice a few street names if it got Joshua Tree to pave these feckers.

My boy be gazin’. It do be like that sometimes

***

On Quitting & The Future

So, in case you missed it (never using the acronym, not sorry), we put The Black Market to rest. It was a good run. The response was nice, although it was a little like attending your own funeral. You can read more about it here if you so please.

Now that I am no longer a "professional" music writer, I...uh...I don't know what that means yet. I'm still trying to navigate some life stuff at the moment that will keep me from fully exploring the possibilities of not spending 40 to 60 hours a month writing and researching a column. In the meantime, I think you'll be the beneficiary of me flailing around in the void in the shape of getting a few more posts like this on this particular Substack. It'll take the newsletter back to where it should've been all along: a quick and dirty summation of stuff that's going on in my musical life. If you didn't sign up for a post or two a week of some messy, less edited-to-death writing, hey, I get it. But in the future, that's probably going to be the deal.

The other thing I need to broach is whether I set up some sort of paid tier for this Substack. I intend to keep both Plague Rages and this newsletter free for those who want to read this slop. Still, considering I just decided to throw my financial situation into a precarious spot as my music addiction continues unabated, it's something I have to ponder. Discogs, guys. Discogs.

Anyway, that's it. If you want, I'm spoiling my year-end list one day at a time on Instagram. And I've got a few new interviews up on Plague Rages. I'll post those below. Thanks for reading and sticking around.