It’s a rare treat to see a band perform live on the eve, of their next album release – they’re guaranteed to be abuzz and in rare form with the anticipation of the drop at midnight. It’s also Dehd’s final night on tour with 81355 (BLESS), the two-emcee, six-member Indianapolis collective with a fantastically inventive fusion of rap and dream pop, able to conjure a stunning range of vibes. Dehd’s last record, Flower of Devotion, saw them reach new heights with a critically-lauded refinement of their sound; their new disc Blue Skies, released through Fat Possum Records, finds the band confidently exploring the space they opened up with FoD.
Dehd themselves are a strange and compelling melding of influences – the three-piece band out of Chicago imbues most of their guitar tones with the energy of surf-rock, but on their slower tracks those same chords bleed over into the forlorn twangs often associated with country. Their sound is still firmly situated in the art-rock space, mind you, but their uncommon touchstones have gently moved them into a sonic niche of their own; and within that space, the vocal delivery of bassist and lead singer Emily Kempf is one of the most unique and multifaceted in all of guitar music right now.
In her most powerful moments, she’s somewhat akin to Bruce Springsteen wired on coffee, summoning immense grit at mach speed. But tracks like the upcoming ‘Stars’ with their staccato delivery recall Elvis and other singers of decades-long past, and for a more modern comparison, she’s got a touch of Angel Olsen in how she’ll unexpectedly swing her voice down into its lower register. This melisma – the way Kempf shifts the note she’s singing across a single syllable – is the defining characteristic of her voice. New song ‘Window’ and their hit ‘Loner’ are some of the best showcases of this technique, and Kempf also has a penchant to just vamp on one beat or letter and then rush into the next line, leveraging a bit of chaos in her cadences.
Accentuating Kempf’s singular vocals are layered complements from guitarist Jason Balla. Balla occasionally takes the lead – something Blue Skies finds him doing more than previous – but when not at the forefront he’s crafting gorgeous vocal harmonies with Kempf that often sound like they couldn’t simply be two people. His head-voiced, sustained cries are another accent that walks the line between surf and alt-country and is just as important to creating that distinctly Dehd sound. Balla will also occasionally grab a tambourine for a brief moment to provide that jangly, avant-pop, Velvets-y influence that marks certain tracks of theirs, such as ‘Desire’ and ‘Flying’ from Flower of Devotion. Onstage Balla plays his guitar like it’s more in control of his movements than he is, or perhaps like it has somehow begun to ascend skyward and he’s got to wrestle it back down into the control of his arms.
The night sees Dehd show off many new tracks from Blue Skies, including ‘Stars’ where Balla and Kempf switch around vocal duties, and the bouncy ‘Bad Love’ which calls back to the style of early rock ‘n’ roll and features sharp drum fills from Eric McGrady, who notably plays sans a kick drum. They segue the latter effortlessly into an older song, ‘Flood’, which while one of Dehd’s slowest tunes is also one of their most powerful and votive; their departures from the bubbly, high-energy tempo of many of their songs only make things like ‘Flood’ hit that much harder. Dehd’s songs are often titled in just one or two words, and their lyrics put forth a front of intentionally-deceptive naivete. “Want nothing more than to be a loner”; “All I know is I love you” – while Kempf’s delivery is wild and will often stretch a word far beyond its original construction, the concepts she and Balla tackle find potency in their simplicity.
A real treat of this pre-release night is the band performing ‘Empty in my Mind’, one of the singles from Blue Skies, for the first time ever. This comes all of one hundred minutes away from the album hitting streaming services at the stroke of twelve, and the room, full to the gills with Dehd fans, is singing along. The band are riding quite a wave, and just in advance of the release of Blue Skies have announced an expansive fall tour, including an October stop in Boston at a venue with nearly triple the capacity of Brighton Music Hall where they are now.
Towards the end of the evening, Kempf, making generous air quotes, says, “This is our ‘last song,’” and the band plays the supremely energetic, stomping ballad that is ‘Flying’, before returning to the stage after a short break with 81355 by their side for one final song. After a bit of setup that sees everyone returning to their instruments, solving the set-long mystery of why the 81355’ drum kit remained onstage, the now-eleven-piece act (two others have materialized from somewhere else) plays ‘Desire’, the spearhead of Flower of Devotion, and Kempf finds her way towards the crowd, posing on the edge of the subwoofers to elated shouts. It’s the end of an album cycle and a leg of their tour, but moreso the beginning of another era for Dehd. And listening to the album in the car on the drive home, moments after its debut, Blue Skies looks to be both a continuation and evolution of everything that has drawn so many to their work thus far.
Review and photos by Collin Heroux
