Jam band mixes jazz and electronica to come up with gigantic sound

Photo: Damien Watson | The Miami Student

By Billy Rafael, Arts & Entertainment Editor
Published: Monday, February 11, 2013
Updated: Monday, February 11, 2013 23:02

It was a dedicated crowd of neon-wearers that flocked to Brick Street Sunday night for some live electronic music. Big Gigantic, a familiar face in Oxford, performed a high-energy set to a packed venue of students looking for a break from a night of studying.

Corey Baker, aka Kill Paris, a DJ from Los Angeles, took the stage before Big Gigantic to get the crowd warmed up. Kill Paris’ set was a mix of smooth R&B samples, heavy hip hop beats and crunchy bass. Despite a few lulls, the audience enjoyed Kill Paris, but by the time he was packing up it was clear they were ready for the main event.

It was nearly 11 p.m. when Big Gigantic took the stage and the crowd was considerably larger than when Kill Paris finished.

“The house was packed for a Sunday night,” Junior Jake Menker, who was celebrating his birthday at the concert, said. “It was a beautiful thing. Big Gigantic killed it.”

Dressed in jeans and white t-shirts, the duo ran on only to become silhouettes for the remainder of the show to the hypnotic light show designed to complement their music. Five big screen panels put on the front of the stage for visuals combined with an array of strobes, lasers and a lot of fog helped set the scene for the other planet that Big Gigantic’s music takes you to.

Big Gigantic is the creation of producer and saxophonist Dominic Lalli and drummer Jeremey Salken. The band’s genre is known as livetronica, a type of electronic music that combines pre-made dance beats with live instrumentals. In the world of electronic music, where many DJs are being criticized for their live shows being simply a task of pushing play on a laptop, it’s refreshing to see the talent of production paired with Lalli’s live jazz elements and Salken’s hard-hitting drumbeats. And how often do you see a pit of college students screaming, yelling and jumping up and down for a saxophone solo?

Read more: http://www.miamistudent.net/arts-entertainment/jam-band-mixes-jazz-and-electronica-to-come-up-with-gigantic-sound-1.2988281#.URsDSqXhEhQ