Sacramento quartet Sister Crayon, opened the show, led by singer Terra Lopez, who used vocal effects so well they functioned as another instrument. Sister Crayon play well crafted songs that are passionately textural. Lopez is backed by a keyboardist who also knocks outs out very impressive beats live on an MPC, another keyboardist who also plays guitar, and a drummer.  Sometimes the bass coming from the keys was so deep my vision literally was vibrating.

Sister Crayon is raising money to buy a van to tour in, so if you feel like opening your pockets to help a very talented band meet their masses you can donate at their Myspace page.

Oakland’s Religious Girls are a three piece: a keyboard player, a drummer, and a gent who does both, all shouting wordlessly together. They have an intensely primal sound, and a vicious playing style. These guys are a must-see.

A fellow concertgoer simply said to me “These guys are loud. Like, really loud.” A great compliment. Hats off to the Rickshaw Stop, the light show looked like the bottom of an UFO spacecraft hired to provide lighting at a rave.

LA-based, married duo Rainbow Arabia are poised to be the next big thing. Singer/guitarist Tiffany Preston has a distant and enchanting voice. Her stage presence was a force, she brought the crowd to near-frenzy. Tiffany’s husband Danny describes their sound (accurately) as electronic afro-pop post-punk. Do yourself a favor and see them as soon as you can, because if they fall into the right hands your next time chance will be from 200 yards away at Coachella.

San Francisco duo Lazer Sword headlined — both armed with laptops connected to new-fangled gadgetry. It sounds like they made all your favorite vintage videogame cartridges snort blow off of a key, and then filtered their soundtracks through an electronic meat grinder. It is as if a glitch nerd and a hip hop head got together and decided to make music that will get girls to take their clothes off to. It got so hot in their I started to worry that the sprinklers were going to go off.

The overall theme for the night’s music was loud — for the next few days the only response you will get from me is, “What?”. This was a very inspired bill, the booker is very deserving of a serious high five. I can honestly say this is one of the best shows I have seen in a long time.