[ATTENDED: November 2, 2022] Julien Chang
I hadn’t heard of Julien Chang (pronounced “Chong” according to him) before this show. He has an album out and a new one out on November 4.
I had listened to a couple of songs beforehand and found them to be nice enough. I was in no way prepared for the band that he brought with him.
His lead guitarist Utah Miller was really fantastic. They looked really young, but there was some serious shredding going on. Julien’s bassist (whose name I didn’t catch played some great riffs and a few sliding bass-like sounds. He also played guitar on a couple of songs (for a three guitar attack!). But his most impressive bandmate was drummer Maya Stepansky. She was all over the kit but in a very controlled manner. With a small drum kit, she played some really impressive and timely fills. She had a lot of subtle moments of the cymbals and was just a stellar accompanist.
Then there was Chang himself. He wrote and played all of the songs on the record (with a couple of exceptions) and his songwriting skills is really quite accomplished. I found some of his arrangements to be really complex and wonderful. He has a jazz composer’s technique, with time changes and major rhythmic shifts in the songs. And obviously allowing Miller to shred and Stepansky to riff shows a complex song structure.
I’m not even sure how to best describe his music. It felt jazzy and poppy. There were some prog rock elements (in the time shifts) and musically I really enjoyed what I heard.
I haven’t heard any of the studio recording of these songs, but I feel like they will simply be a lot better live.
- Heart Holiday
- Snakebit
- Butterflies in Morocco
- Marmalade
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