The Chemical Brothers came back to the Windy City bringing their own heat to an already seasonally warm fall. The British DJ duo of Tom Rowlands and Ed Simons packed the Riviera and treated the crowd to an intense array of audio and sensory experiences. The overwhelming visual show and deafening volumes quickly produced a horde of dancing bodies drenched in sweat.
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Chemical Brothers |
 Entertainment
Art
Riviera Theater
Chicago, Ill.
September 21, 2007
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Rowland and Simons, who are sometimes referred as the fathers of the arena-electronic-music, started DJing together back in the early ‘90s, and were strongly influenced by the likes of Paul Oakenfold, Kraftwerk and Cabaret Voltaire, to name a few. Their career sky rocketed after the release of their debut album in 1995. Now they have finally made it back to the USA after a 5 years hiatus to promote their recently released 6th album, “We Are The Night”.
Backed-up by a plethora of sophisticated electronic paraphernalia, Rowlands and Simons launched the show with “No Path to Follow.” A seamless merger into the electric, “Galvanize,” let the already sweaty crowd know in the early what they were in store for this evening. “Hey Boy, Hey Girl” got the audience frantically jumping up and down, hands in the air, all in perfect synch with the throbbing beats; and for a moment, it felt like the place would succumb and explode into pure energy.
Intense images and lighting effects intensified each of their tunes. Video projections -which tended to the disturbing side- made us all feel sometimes as if we were part on a wacky, psychedelic trip to Planet Chemical Brothers. We were treated to horror clips from the Blair Witch Project during ‘Out of Control”, to a creepy gigantic Stephen King like talking clown face during the tune, “Do It Again”.
The flickering religious images and themes during “Believe” made you feel as if you were inside of a creepy videogame that kept preaching “I need you to believe in something.” Giant marching robots appeared during “Under The Influence” and looked as if they would overtake the audience and seize the Riviera. All the while, the wizards of Rowlands and Simons continued to turn all the knobs and switches that we could never see, but could only believe to be there.
At the time of the encore, the crowd seemed to be winding down mostly because of lack of fresh air, yet the words of “The Brothers are going to work it out,” guided the followers to continue on. The Brothers included both “Leave Home” followed by the bombastic “Block Rocking Beats” to a satisfying close. The sweaty crowd enthusiastically danced away, punching their fists into the air one last time.
It was a fantastic show, Rowland and Simons’ perfect synthesis of loud electronica with vivid and intriguing visual effects allowed the audience to feel as if they were part of the songs and to fully experience each tune with all their senses. While the heat at times was at times unbearable, that was not the biggest issue. The volume was so high that my ears were still ringing for another 48 hours and may never be the same. Still, the Riviera Theater was a once in a lifetime chance to see the Chemical Brothers in such a small venue still on top of their game.
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