For your ears only

>> Dr. Noh just say yes to live drum & bass

by CHRIS HATHERILL

"Did you bring ear plugs?" asks Mike Shulha, one of the two drummers in Dr. Noh. Shaking my head, I tuck my hood up around my ears and look around. I seem to be the only one out of the six band members and accompanying sound guy who isn't prepared for what's to come. Not only are there two full drum kits, but also two basses, a guitar, a trumpet with wires coming out, a pile of DJ-type stuff, a lot of cables, a minefield of effects pedals and far too many speakers for comfort. We're hiding not very deep underground in an appropriately James-Bond-style evil lair, complete with silver walls, exposed pipes and a swivelling white egg chair. There's a decently evil-looking cat wandering around upstairs but I can't get it to come down and perch on the armrest. The band soon makes it clear why.

Moving rapidly from downtempo jazz noodling into a languid breakbeat and finally full-on drum & bass, Dr. Noh launch into a live, and hence loud, barrage of sound. In a scene where twisting a knob always lowers the volume, it's kind of nice to hear something physical which can't be turned down.

"When we first started getting into drum & bass, we kept thinking, 'Hey, this is stuff that is totally possible to play live,'" says Shulha. "I mean, the original drum break from 'Amen Brother' is just a guy drumming, and that sample basically created drum & bass. For us, it's just logical to bring it back to the musical side."

Though first inspired by Reprazent's live take on New Forms and by Amon Tobin's jazz & bass mutations, Dr. Noh are coming from a different angle. Instead of trying to recreate existing tracks on stage, the seven-member band prefers to bring elements of drum & bass, jazz, downtempo, funk and ambient into a coherent whole--something that is not always easy.

"When all of us are playing together, we've got to make sure it's not too overwhelming," says Neal Gupta, the crew's main bassist and one of the three founding members. "The tracks come from live jams where we all try new parts, which can get pretty chaotic."

Balancing out the musical instrument side of the collective is Blake Markle, aka Blackmarket, who you might remember from live drum & bass duo Black & Woolly. When the woollier side of the operation left for California, Markle found it only natural to start working with the crew, adding analog basslines and samples to the soup.

"A lot of the sounds I add blend in really well," he says. "We'll have two basslines going back and forth, which is a lot more random than just programming everything on the computer. All kinds of little things happen when we play, then when we listen to the recording we pick up on that and use it."

Asked about the case with hardcore drum & bass fans in their face, Shulha shrugs.

"We get all kinds of people at the shows, from 'real' drum & bass fans to people who just like live music. We're not trying to be one thing or another; we just borrow ideas from everywhere. Drum & bass has infiltrated house and hip hop and garage, which is good because it keeps things changing. We're just another variation on that."

At Tokyo on Tuesday, Feb. 20, 11pm, $4