Less than a year into their project, Boojum is a jamband on the rise, having recently wrapped their first festival performance at LonCon in central New York and now halfway through their first residency at the Brooklyn Art Häus.
The four-piece – Chris Mackin (guitar), Josh Santiago (guitar), SarahElaz (bass), and Mike Coiro (drums) – have taken to the setting with aplomb, using the residency as a chance to test out new material in a four-show run featuring unique repeat-free setlists. For Friday’s show, the theme was “Looking Glass” and the band was joined by Kim Berg as the Red Queen and special guest Ethan Smestad on vocals.
It’s clear Boojum is getting comfortable pushing the black box theater’s limits to expand their attendees’ minds and push the boundaries of performance. Opening the show with two debuts, audiences were welcomed into the world of Wonderland with bouncing grooves for the back-to-back debuts of “Step Into” and “Pass Through.”
By the time the band returned to more familiar material with “Nonsense if you Like,” the room was set to spinning through disco-tinged grooves, supported by a sultry guest vocal performance from Kim Berg. Fully decked in black and white checkerboard, Boojum doesn’t limit their spectacle to the music as dancers Cameron Kay and Rachel Caron joined the fray. With the chess pieces set, Elaz laid into a blistering bassline that pushed the group’s jamming upwards in intensity.
The group’s rhythm section continued to drive the pace into the debut of “Pig Baby Blues” with Coiro laying a backbeat for Rachel Caron to add her own percussion to the groove with a tapdance solo followed by a drum solo before the band blasted into one of their hardest jams of the night.
“Pig Baby” has been a crowd favorite since its inception and from watching Mackin, Santiago, and Elaz’s mimicry of one another, it’s clearly a song the group has fun playing too. The introduction of the “Pig Baby Blues” lead-in gave the band a chance to amp this suite up another level.
Never afraid to have too much fun Santiago and Mackin would take a bewildering twist and turn “Pig Baby” into an extended jam based around Danny Elfman’s iconic Simpsons title theme. Balanced on the knife edge between recognizable and reimagined, the reworking raised a moment of levity before building to a heart-pumping performance from Smestad as the horrifying titular Pig Baby. Slaying the monster proved to be an easy feat for our heroes in Boojum, thanks to the power of rock and roll.
To celebrate their victory, we were rewarded with a seafood feast as the band lept into “Oysters” featuring another display of Boojum’s theatricality. Kay and Caron would return to the stage as molluscs come alive as something out of a cartoon, cowled with shells and resplendent with pearls thanks to costuming assistance from Megan Roe.
The second set opened with a push into the psychedelic with “Looking Glass House” as Kay and Caron took to the stage adorned as giant eyeballs. Their performance and the mindbending guitar playing were complimented by visual artist Casey McArtney’s projections, as she took the opportunity to pay homage to Pink Floyd’s Pulse spinning eyes around the room.
“Chessmen” was another debut for the night, featuring a band first with Mike Coiro taking over lead vocals before the band led the crowd into the night’s most dramatic number, “Vorpal Sword”. Featuring Ethan Smestad as the hero wielding the magical Vorpal Sword the show would enter its most conceptual as we enter his innermost thoughts to see him grow the courage to confront the Jabberwocky (performed by Caron in full costume). Driven by an exhilarating guitar line, the hero emerged triumphant, offering attendees a moment of respite before diving back into the psychedelic.
“Living Backwards” was another rockling jam that drove the idea of crescendo to the extreme, testing how intense the band’s playing can get before pulling a heel turn as they entered the debut of la Bamba-esq “Red Queen’s Race.” The tropical tune lifted audiences back to elation with a groove that sounded almost as if someone took the iconic “la bamba” riff and dunked it in a psychedelic paint bucket. It certainly sent me searching for when the Grateful Dead covered the Ritchie Valens arrangement (MSG, September 1987).
With Caron and Kay still dancing in the audience Boojum kept with their tradition to close with a Wonderland-themed cover, going with an on-the-fly bust out of the Beatles “Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds.”
Boojum has committed to the bit when it comes to pushing the boundaries of experimentation. Walking off stage, the group focused on the road ahead, planning for how they would continue to surprise audiences to the penultimate show of their residency. What do they have in store? The only way to find out is to follow the band down the rabbit hole on October 11. Come ready for a swashbuckling adventure, because the band has hinted that the theme will be Pirates.
Boojum has two shows left in their Brooklyn Art Häus residency, the next show is October 11th.
Tickets are available at: https://www.stellartickets.com/o/brooklyn-art-haus–2/events/electric-wonderland
Boojum’s Electric Wonderland – Looking Glass, 9/27/24, Brooklyn Art Häus, Brooklyn, NY
Set 1: Step Into> Pass Through, Nonsense if you Like> Pig Baby Blues> Pig Baby, Oysters
Set 2: Looking Glass House> Chessmen, Vorpal Sword, Living Backwards, Red Queen’s Race
Encore: Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds
Show Notes:
Kim Berg on vocals as the Red Queen on Nonsense, Pig Baby, and Red Queen’s Race.
Ethan Smestad as a guest performer as the Pig Baby and vocals for Vorpal Sword.
Pig Baby featuring Simpson’s theme jam
Cameron Kay and Rachel Caron dancing for Nonsense, Oysters, Looking Glass, Vorpal Sword and Red Queen Race.
Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds, Beatles cover.
First time played: Step Into, Pass Through, Pig Baby Blues, Chessmen, Living Backwards, Red Queen’s Race, Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds.
