The Reptilian Conspiracy Theory posits that there is an intergalactic group of lizards who, by assuming human form and amassing financial, political and cultural power, secretly control Earth.
Most serious interpretations of the theory hold a priori that this is undesirable: that human society has been enslaved and must fight to regain autonomy.
Ride one stop on the subway, see how we’re all stuck on our phones, and it’s pretty hard not to be convinced.
Granted, DOMi and JD Beck are probably not lizard people. But their disorienting, expansive compositions; their oddball esthetic – DOMi with her pigtails and her avian, angular aspect, Beck with his antigravity locks and half-slung dungarees; their let’s say ‘unconventional’ approach to crowd work; and, most importantly, their trans-human talent do make you wonder…
All of which begs the question: if we had more music like this, would being ruled by reptiles be such a bad thing?
The duo are touring their sophomore album Who Asked?, a “psychotically ambitious symphonic project” whose writing, says Beck, drove them to insanity. Where their first album Not Tight (which was, by the way, definitely tight) included a list of jaw dropping guest features, the pair went full PTA-mode on Who Asked?, taking control of everything from writing, mixing, mastering and, this time, singing.
The record is so clean, so perfectly performed, that it is easy to forget that it’s made by real people. The opening notes of the show – their liveness – come as a shock. If they bit off more than they could chew in its recording (let’s just say it doesn’t sound all that symphonic), then it is a thing to be heard live, surrounded by other, adoring, people.
In other words: if there is something extraterrestrial about the whole thing, then seeing them perform at Sony Hall in New York City Thursday, September 24 was a reminder of the humanity of jazz music.
They opened with a cover of ‘Fast City’ by Weather Report, a nod to their jazz-fusion heritage. Despite the duo’s irreverent stage presence (at one point DOMi makes a dick joke while Beck smashes various strange noises on his sampler), it is clear that they take the jazz seriously.
The rest of the set focused largely on tracks from Who Asked? but without the vocals. Thankfully, this gives their playing, and their compositions at large, space to flourish.
Describing the music is not all that easy: there is the poppy ‘EXiT’, with its conventional-ish structure and catchy breakdown; but then there is ‘LOVELY MASQUERADE’, whose chest-vibrating bassline sounds like a cross between Run The Jewels and Jaga Jazzist; and then there is ‘CLiMBING HiGH’, the album’s penultimate track, which sounds like an indie song from 2011 run through some kind of a nyan cat-inspired machine.
Jazz doesn’t even feel like an appropriate label.
But you don’t really need to be told what the music’s like; you need to hear what it is. Though Beck claims they are “super rusty” (to groans from the crowd), listening to them nail every stop and start, every change in time signature, is a dizzying experience.
They seem psychically connected and there is a unique balance to them, a symmetry, as they sit face-to-face on stage. (Beck only ever takes his eyes off her only to shake his shaggy mane about, afraid perhaps that if he were to look away he might get lost.)
What makes the drummer totally unique is the squareness to his playing. Where most drummers use dynamics, with each note softer or louder than the one before, Beck spends most of his time at the same volume. He never seems to be moving all that quickly, but something is happening – lots of things, more like – basically all the time, on every 16th, 100 miles per hour. He hits every note so cleanly, so consistently, so squarely, that the effect is something uncanny, something not quite human.
(When I first heard DOMi and JD Beck’s music I was sure, in the way I’m sure that shoes will fit in the morning or that I sign with my right hand, that the whole thing was made on a computer.)
He seems all potential energy, a wind-up spring, slowly unravelling across the night. He’s hunched over his kit, never really still, even when he’s not playing. Meanwhile DOMi – Earth name Domitille Degalle – is the very image of poise: back arrowed straight up, arms at ten and two. Watching her hands move over the keyboard feels like watching raindrops on a puddle.
The effect is like a seesaw, a game of cat and mouse, of the two chasing each other round the stage.
They seem emotionally connected too. Beck asks for a round of applause for DOMi, and it is clear from the way he points his drumstick at her, softly, like Dumbledore holding his wand, that her biggest fan is up there with her.
The music is a little disorienting for anyone not used to counting in groups of seven. Even when there is a more conventional time signature, none of the notes are actually on the beat. Even the more beautiful moments are fleeting.
And so without the mainstream influences of the first album, Who Asked? feels more like outsider music. It screams problem child: regular detentions and a Ritalin prescription. It’s true that jazz and Gen Z are uncommon bedfellows, so the album feels like an appeal to those who don’t quite fit in at school, to those for whom being online is an escape from the horror-show that is modern adolescence. Jazz is for you too, they seem to be saying.
So yes, it can feel a little confusing, a little extraterrestrial. But see it in the flesh, feel DOMi’s bass in your chest and hear, in real time, Beck’s robotic whirring. This is a reminder that there is a real world out there, with real music in it. Controlled by reptiles or no, we should put our phones down and enjoy it.
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