Blaqk Audio at the Bowery Ballroom

In 2001, Davey Havok and Jade Puget were active members of AFI, but started writing electronic music very unlike AFI. Their intention was to create an entirely electronic side project with vocals, synthesizers, keyboards, drum machines, and software. Increasingly busy with AFI, they returned to the project only in 2006. Blaqk Audio's debut album was released in 2007 and debuted at number one on the Billboard Dance/Electronic Albums chart. Blaqk Audio released its fourth and most recent studio album, Only Things We Love, on March 15, 2019.

At the Bowery Ballroom tonight, Blaqk Audio's music explored and adapted the history of electronic music from the lighter electro-pop of the 1980s, through the futurepop and bigbeat movements at the turn of the century, and ultimately to the darker EBM and darkwave of the current post punk scene. The set featured songs from all four Blaqk Audio albums plus a cover of Dead or Alive's 1984 hit "You Spin Me Round (Like a Record)." Havok sang clearly and worked the audience by endlessly pacing the lip of the stage as Puget provided all the pulsing layers of electronic sound and the heart-racing beats-per-minute. The newer, heavier material showed the band to be not all retro-sounding but also cutting edge. The duo also demonstrated the limitations of having one singer and one instrumentalist, however. Puget's music had a sometimes uncomfortable chill and Havok's vocals as the sole organic instrument grew rather same-y. One can only wonder how much warmer and more exciting the performance might have been had there been more musicians on stage generating live musical interplay and dynamics.

Setlist:

1. First to Love
2. Waiting to Be Told
3. Anointed
4. OK, Alex
5. The Viles
6. Again, Again and Again
7. Unstained
8. Dark Times at the Berlin Wall
9. Cities of Night
10. Material
11. Graphic Violence
12. Bitter for Sweet
13. Ill-Lit Ships
14. Stiff Kittens

Encore:

1. You Spin Me Round (Like a Record) (Dead or Alive cover)
2. Semiotic Love