Alex Bleeker and the Freaks- “Getting By”- Live- Micro-Pixel-Rites BBQ- SXSW- Austin, TX- March 18, 2010 from Samantha Cornwell on Vimeo.
Seeing Alex Bleeker and the Freaks live is kind of like opening a box of chocolates; you never know what you’re gonna get — but at the same time, you kind of do. For one, you can count on them channeling something as perfectly all-American as Forest Gumps’s metaphor; but the group of people doing all the channeling changes every time. When Bleeker rolled up the Micro-Pixel-Rites showcase with the other three members of Real Estate in tow, we were delighted to experience an unusually rhythm-centric incarnation of his revolving casts of Freaks: Martin Courtney riding a deft and bouncy bass line, Matt Mondanile behind the drum kit, and Etienne Duguay pattering away free-style on a pair of stand-up bongos. Visually, they struck a striking silhouette; musically, however, they sounded as humble and quietly hopeful as driving away from what might have been heartbreak, looking up at night sky, breathing in the ice-cold desert air, and thanking the universe that you are just “getting by.”
Video: Samantha Cornwell
Words: Emilie Friedlander
Tags: Alex Bleeker and the Freaks, Getting By, Micro-Pixel-Rites, Real Estate